IEC University:
The Case That Closed With Nothing Found

Background: why this RTI was filed

An allegation and its resolution rarely travel together. The Himachal Pradesh Private Educational Institutions Regulatory Commission registered Suo-Moto Case No. 11 of 2023 over 153 degrees in the name of IEC University, Baddi. That case title circulated. What happened at the end of it did not, because regulators close files quietly and there is no news value in a finding of nothing.

A first RTI, answered on 06.05.2024, had established that the case was then pending adjudication and had released the reports of the two expert committees sent to inspect the student records. Those reports were already pointing in one direction: the second committee, after checking admission forms, fee records, attendance registers, examination forms, gazettes and green sheets for all 153 students, recorded that it saw no probable chance of irregularity.

This second application went back for the thing the first reply could not yet provide: the final orders. It was received by the Commission on 26.06.2024 and answered the same day, reference No. HPPERC/302/RTI Vol-X/2024-784, over the signature of the PIO-cum-Law Officer. Two annexures came back. Annexure-B is the order sheet.

The order

The order sheet is headed “Suo Moto V/s IEC University”, Case Called 11 of 2023, dated 13.05.2024. Under “Present” it records: For Petitioner, None. For Respondent, None. The matter was decided on the papers.

The order itself runs to a short paragraph. “On perusal of original attendance record of all 153 students, it has been found that there are no irregularities in admitting these 153 students and the same has been observed by the expert committee.” The Commission then states its own conclusion: “there is no discrepancies/ irregularities in admitting these 153 students, hence the original record be returned to respondent University and nothing survives in this matter and the same is disposed off.”

Two members signed it: Prof. Shashi Kant Sharma and Sh. Lalit Kumar. The direction to return the original records is the administrative sign that the Commission considered the matter finished.

What the Commission would and would not do

The reply's first answer is worth noting on its own. Asked to verify the degrees mentioned in the application against the Commission's record, HP-PERC replied that “the verification of degrees of students awarded by any private University does not comes under the purview of HP-PERC”.

This is a jurisdictional point with practical consequences. The regulator supervises institutions; it does not operate a degree-checking counter. An employer who wants to know whether a particular certificate is genuine cannot get that answer from the Commission, and must go to the university's examination branch. A regulator's clean bill of health for an institution and the authenticity of one certificate are different questions.

The wording of Annexure-A

The second answer repays close reading, because the question and the answer do not use the same vocabulary. The application asked the Commission to confirm whether certain names were present “in the list of 153 fake degree issued by IEC University”. The Commission's reply supplies a list, but describes it differently: “The list of 153 students to whom degrees were awarded by IEC University called by this Commission during hearing in Case No. 11 of 2023”.

That is not a list of fake degrees. It is the list of degree recipients the Commission called for so that it could examine their records — the same 153 whose admissions it then found to be free of irregularity. The distinction is the whole case.

The annexure itself runs to four pages, splitting the 153 into a 2021 pass-out group and a 2022 group, each row giving a serial number, a university serial number, a student name and a father's name. Every page carries the Commission's RTI supply stamp. It is a register of private individuals, released to an applicant under the Act, and it is not reproduced on this site.

Key findings

“There is no discrepancies/ irregularities in admitting these 153 students, hence the original record be returned to respondent University and nothing survives in this matter and the same is disposed off.”

— HP-PERC Order Sheet, Case Called 11 of 2023, dated 13.05.2024 (Annexure-B)

What employers and students should know

Employers should not screen out an IEC University candidate on the strength of Case No. 11 of 2023. The case is closed and the Commission found no irregularities in the admissions it examined. The correct check is the ordinary one — put the registration number to the university's Controller of Examinations. HP-PERC has said in terms that it cannot answer that question for you.

Graduates of the university from the 2021 and 2022 batches now have a document to point to. The order of 13.05.2024 is the regulator's own finding, signed by two of its members, and it says nothing survives in the matter.

Anyone who repeated the “153 fake degrees” claim should note that the phrase originated as a case title and did not survive the case. Continuing to circulate it as established fact, after the Commission has recorded the opposite, is no longer reporting an allegation — it is asserting something the record contradicts.