In a severe blow to government doctors in Tamil Nadu, the Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a petition seeking exclusive quota for ‘in service doctors’ in admission to postgraduate medical degree courses.
A five-judge Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra dismissed an application for interim relief to stay Regulation 9(4) and (8) of the Medical Council of India’s Post Graduate Medical Education Regulations of 2000.
The provisions provide reservation to ‘in-service doctors’ in postgraduate diploma courses and not for degree courses. The application also sought a direction to allow the Tamil Nadu government have 50 percent quota for ‘in-service doctors’.
The Regulation provided up to 10% of the marks obtained for each year of service spent in remote and/or difficult areas.
Writing the judgment for the Bench, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud rejected the contention that Tamil Nadu had been following the pattern of reservation in respect of 50% of State quota for the ‘in-service’ candidates from 2007 and it should not be disturbed.
The court said the MCI had, as an expert body, proceeded on a principled basis. Any interim relief now would amount to a mandatory final order, which could not be countenanced. The proviso to Rule 9(IV) did not contemplate a reservation for ‘in-service’ candidates in postgraduate courses, but only the grant of incentive marks.
The Bench, therefore, said prescribing a separate source of entry for ‘in-service’ degree candidates would directly result in lowering of standards in medical education. A separate reservation for in-service candidates in degree courses would impinge upon the regulatory powers of the MCI.
To the State’s arguments that it should not be denuded of its power to frame a policy for admission, the Bench observed that the term ‘reservations’ referred to in the opening sentence of the Regulations were obviously constitutional reservations for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, the socially and educationally backward classes of citizens and not for ‘in-service’ government doctors.
