Tamil Nadu: Following Madras High Court's direction seeking response on whether additional seats can be created to accommodate candidates under the 7.5% Government school quota, the National Medical Commission (NMC) has now informed the Court that such additional seats cannot be created in the 24 medical colleges of Tamil Nadu.
The counsel for NMC submitted that the creation of such additional medical seats cannot be done without the prior sanction of the apex court.
NMC also reiterated that the top court has repeatedly instructed the high courts not to issue orders regarding the creation of such additional medical seats.
In a recent case where a Telangana based medical college was asked to pay compensation to MS Surgery candidate, the apex court had also stated, "It has been repeatedly held by this Court that directions cannot be issued for increasing annual intake capacity and to create seats. The annual intake capacity is fixed by the Medical Council of India (now National Medical Commission) which has to strictly adhere. Admissions to Medical Colleges cannot be permitted to be made beyond the sanctioned annual intake capacity of a medical college as has been repeatedly held by this Court."
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The NMC response came in connection with the case where candidates who opted for medical courses in self aided medical colleges approached the court after they had to stay as waitlisted candidates as they failed to pay the fee.
Previously team reported that appearing before the bench comprising justice Anand Venkatesh, the counsel for the petitioner submitted that they were unable to secure medical admission in the institutions of their choice as it was not possible for them to pay the fee of the medical and dental courses.
In October the Tamil Nadu government issued an order regarding the implementation of the 7.5% quota within the existing reservation in MBBS, BDS, Ayush courses for the students of the state government's higher secondary school.
The petitioners submitted that if the state government would have announced that it would sponsor all students under the Government quota who are allotted seats in self-financing colleges a bit earlier, then the petitioners would not have opted for being waitlisted candidates due to the monetary crisis.
Considering the fact that there are as many as 24 government medical colleges available in the state, the court suggested that if one or two additional seats can be arranged in each of the government medical colleges, then all the waitlisted candidates who could not secure admission under regular vacancy will be able to secure admission in several medical courses. Hence the court sought the opinion of NMC on this.
Advocate General Vijay Narayan informed the court that 11 MBBS seats have been reverted to the state quota from the all India quota and in addition to 15 BDS seats. According to the current status, they have 26 seats which can be allotted to students under the Government school quota.
Responding to the court's query, on Thursday the counsel for NMC stated that the creation of such additional seats is impossible especially as it needs the Supreme Court's prior approval, reports TOI
In view of the submissions made by NMC, the judge refrained from passing any such order instructing the creation of additional seats. The court added that if such an order is challenged and eventually reversed by the apex court, it would be more cruel for the students.
Representing the petitioner, the senior advocate P Wilson requested that priority must be given to the students who are waitlisted. On this, after noticing that AG has already concurred with the submission, the court instructed that after the second round of regular counseling is concluded, the authorities should conduct a separate counseling for such students.