Kerala - Kochi   

PG medical admissions: order reserved on federation plea

Kochi: The Kerala High Court on Monday reserved its order on a plea of the Kerala Christian Professional College Management Federation to grant an interim stay on a State government order cancelling admission made to government seats for postgraduate medical courses in the self-financing medical colleges under the federation and directing the Director of Medical Education to conduct fresh allotments to these seats.

Justice Antony Dominic reserved its order after conclusion of arguments on the stay petition. Counsel for the federation contended that college managements had filled the government seats as the government failed to allot students to any of the government seat in time despite repeated reminders.

He contended that after finalising the fee structure, the managements wrote to the State government urging it to allot students to the 50 per cent government seats.

He submitted that since the last date for admission was May 31 as per the Medical Council of India norms, the government was asked to make allotments on or before May 25.

The managements could admit only a limited number of candidates because of the limited time set by the Medical Council of India. The Supreme Court order extending the deadline for admission was not applicable to the private medical colleges. Counsel also pointed out that the apex court order was only applicable to the all India quota allotted to the State.

The seats earmarked for the State quota in the self-financing colleges did not come under this category. He refuted the allegation of the State government that the whole selection process was illegal.

The managements were given various options to determine merit of the candidates. In fact, the determination of merit was not the result of a combination of the different methods. Counsel submitted that they had not violated any of the MCI norms.

The Advocate-General contended that the managements could not dictate to the State government the deadline for allotting candidates. The procedure for admission right from the publication of admission notification was irregular.

It was not transparent. In fact, the MCI regulations had been watered down and the managements had adopted an entirely different selection criterion. The basic concept of inter se merit had been totally compromised.

It had admitted students from Pondicherry and other States without following the inter se merit. The unfilled all India quota seats had been surrendered after June 24 in accordance with the Supreme Court direction, the final round of allotment for the State quota could be conducted only after June 24.

As the unfilled State quota included the 50 per cent seats in the self-financing colleges as well, those seats could be filled in the second/ final round of allotment which would be held on June 28.

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