CUTTACK: THE Orissa High Court has dismissed a petition challenging the Presidential Award of Certificate of Honour in Classical Odia-2019 to scholar Antaryami Mishra and ruled that there is no illegality in selection of Mishra for the honour.
Instituted by the Ministry of Education, the Government of India confers Certificates of Honour to scholars in the 10 regional languages including classical Odia every year.
The division bench of Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice SK Mishra said the Court is satisfied that the view taken by both the pre-scrutiny screening committee as well as the selection committee on the eminence of Antaryami Mishra is a plausible one and there is no illegality attached to the ultimate decision in selecting him for the award.
“As far as eligibility is concerned, the Court is satisfied that the mere fact that Mishra may not have a PhD degree would not disentitle him for the award. As rightly explained, the teaching experience and research are two of the criterions that might be considered amongst many others for grant of the award”, the bench ruled.
The ruling came on Tuesday while dismissing a petition filed by Odia scholar Natabar Satapathy questioning the Central government’s decision to award Mishra. He alleged that Mishra had not obtained PhD from any university, not worked on Odia language, literature or researched in the field of classical Odia and none of his books has been recognised as textbook in any educational institution.
“Therefore, he cannot be said to be a scholar of eminence in classical Odia”, his petition read.
Satapathy had also alleged that the selection process was vitiated as Gopabandhu Mishra - who was one of the persons who had recommended Mishra’s name - was later a member of the selection committee.
However, the bench ruled, “The fact that Gopabandhu, who was one of the persons who recommended the name of Antaryami was part of the selection committee, would not vitiate the selection process, particularly considering the fact that he was one among 10 eminent persons in the committee whose decision was unanimous”.