It has further approved the court fees Delhi (Amendment) Bill 2011 which will be placed in the Legislative Assembly. The Cabinet has also decided to henceforth stop use of objectionable words being mentioned in the Caste Certificates being issued by the competent authorities under the City Government. The decisions were taken today in a Cabinet meeting presided over by Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit.
While briefing the media after the Cabinet meeting, she stated that pending a final decision form the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, the City Government has decided to increase reservation of OBC students in all Govt. run educational institutions located in Delhi from existing 15% to 21% of total seats. To ensure that the seats available for the general candidates are not reduced in absolute numbers, the total number of seats in each discipline would be increased by 12%. Hence, increase in reservation for OBC students will not at all affect students belonging to other communities. It has also been decided to effect no reduction in respect of SC quota seats. Mrs Dikshit further stated that her government is committed to safeguard the interests of all the communities and provide reasonable opportunities of education to every community.
She said that the Cabinet has approved a proposal for granting NOC to allow existing higher educational institutions to run existing approved course from lal dora, extended lal dora, agricultural land, school buildings and other non-confirming areas and also to allow increase in intake and addition of courses to the institutes / colleges functioning in lal dora, extended lal dora for the academic year 2011-12. The decision has been taken to avoid any disruption in studies of the students enrolled in such institutions. It may be recalled that the GGS I.P. University granted affiliation to a large number of self-financed privately managed institutes in Delhi after obtaining NOC from the city government that run technical and professional courses. Quite a few of these institutes are located in lal dora, extended lal dora, agricultural land school buildings, non-confirming areas and rented premises.
The decision of Cabinet will benefit ten institutes functioning from school premises, 14 functioning in lal dora, extended lal dora, agricultural land, two in rented buildings in other non-confirming areas and seven diploma level institutes functioning from lands / premises in non-confirming areas or school buildings. The NOCs were renewed for the academic year 2007-08, 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11. The institutes will also be allowed to make increase in intake in existing course as well as adding new courses for the academic year 2011-12 and the second shift will also be allowed provided they fulfill all the necessary conditions in terms of space, security, faculty, library, etc. No new construction will be allowed by the institutions on account of adding new courses or increasing the intake of existing courses and no alteration to existing buildings on this account shall be made.
The CM also stated that the Cabinet has approved the Court Fees (Delhi Amendment) Bill 2011 which will be placed in the next session of the Delhi Vidhan Sabha. The Cabinet has opined that the fees payable as on date are negligible in today’s context and in certain cases; the value is so little that it has lost its relevance. In fact, in many cases the cost of issuing stamp and administering the payment of court fees is more than the fees collected. Hence, it makes a case to rationalize the fees. The court fees schedules applicable in Delhi were last amended in 1958 by the Punjab Government which were extended to Delhi and the same have continued till date in Delhi. The Court Fees Act, 1870 provides for levy of court fees on various documents / instruments at the time of filing / presenting such documents before the courts. It has been decided to reasonably rationalize the court fees and collection by e-court fees. The court fees are charged in two ways – first as ad valorem fees and second as fixed fees mentioned in two separate schedules.
The issue of a reported incident of mentioning an objectionable word relating to the caste of an applicant while issuance of a Caste Certificate in Delhi was also discussed in the Cabinet. She stated that all the Ministers expressed their concern over this act of omission. The Cabinet decided to stop use of particular objectionable word with immediate effect. The City Government is issuing strict instructions for this purpose. Further, it has been decided to send a communication to the Union Home Ministry for making an amendment in this regard.
