CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has made it clear that the fact that the Bill on common entrance test (CET) in Tamil Nadu is yet to be notified does not "preclude the court from deciding the merit and validity" of the legislation.

Hearing a public interest litigation petition from Nishanth Ramesh, a Plus II student, challenging Tamil Nadu Regulation of Admission in Professional Courses Act 2006 on Monday, the First Bench observed that without undue delay students must know whether they must write the CET or not in the coming academic year. "At this stage, students must know their fate one way or the other."

The Bench comprising Chief Justice A.P. Shah and Justice Prabha Sridevan then posted the matter to February 21 for further proceedings.

Earlier, Advocate-General N.R. Chandran and Additional Advocate-General A.L. Somayaji submitted that though the Governor had given his assent to the legislation, rules were yet to be framed. "The legislation has not been brought into force," he said, and added that the PIL was not maintainable.

To this, Mr. Justice Shah said: "That it has not been brought into force will not preclude the court from deciding its validity... We make it clear that interests of the student community are most important. Students cannot be kept in suspense."

K.M. Vijayan, senior counsel for the petitioner, said notifying the Bill was only an administrative action and the Government might prolong it and keep people guessing. "They may prolong it till March and make the writ petition infructuous." He said a common entrance test could not be held for only a section of students.

When Mr. Vijayan prayed for an interim injunction restraining the Government from issuing a notification, the Chief Justice wondered if courts could restrain Governments from issuing notifications. He, however, added, "If the Act is brought into force, courts can stay it."

In his petition, Mr. Nishanth Ramesh contended that despite clear legal decisions, the State Government had passed the impugned legislation, "brushing aside the requirement of constitutional mandate to conduct the CET for all those who are equally placed and violating the principle of equality." Maintaining that the State could not have admission rules inconsistent with the Centre's regulations, he pointed out that Central councils regulating medical, dental, agricultural education and other professional studies mandated a CET.

He said the impugned legislation was directly in conflict with the Central legislation as well as the Supreme Court judgments .

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