A Division Bench of the Madras High Court on Thursday permitted the State government to go ahead with postgraduate medical admissions for 2018-19 by providing incentive marks to government doctors working in rural, remote and hilly areas. It, however, held such marks should not be granted to those working in urban government hospitals just because they had been posted in trauma, accident, emergency or neonatal intensive care units.
Justices V. Parthiban and P.D. Audikesavalu passed the order while partly allowing a writ appeal preferred by the State government against a judgment passed by a single judge who had quashed two Government Orders, related to the provision of incentive marks, on the ground that almost the entire State had been classified as either rural, remote or hilly area in an attempt to give an edge to in-service candidates as opposed to other meritorious candidates.
Authoring the judgment for the Bench, Mr. Justice Parthiban said the categorisation adopted by the State government on the basis of the recommendations made by an expert committee did not appear to be strictly falling in line with Regulation 9 (iv) of the Post Graduate Medical Education Regulations, 2000, issued by the Medical Council of India and the directions issued by the Supreme Court with respect to giving weightage to government doctors. The judge pointed out that the MCI regulations provided for giving incentive marks at the rate of 10% of the marks obtained by in-service candidates in the NEET for each year of service in remote or difficult areas up to maximum of 30% of the marks obtained by them in the test.
The regulations permit the State government concerned to define the remote and difficult areas from time to time solely on the basis of geography.
However, the Tamil Nadu government had gone ahead and and paved way for providing incentive marks even to government doctors working in cities and towns on the ground that they had been posted in specialised units such as Comprehensive Emergency Obstetrics and New Born Care (CEmONC), Sick Newborn Care Units (SNCU), trauma, accident, emergency care and neonatal intensive care units and this could not be allowed, the Bench held.
At the same time, holding that the categorisation adopted by the government on the basis of geographic location of medical institutions could not be held to be “entirely incorrect” and also taking into consideration that medical admissions should be completed before May 31, the court, in larger public interest, permitted the government to admit students this year by providing incentive marks to those who fall under the geographical classifications made under the two GOs. In so far as future admissions were concerned, The Bench suggested that the committee could be headed by a retired High Court judge. Since the categorisation adopted by the government was being challenged in the court almost every year, the court said that It would be expedient for the panel to have the benefit of legal acumen of a former judge before making recommendations, for identifying rural, remote and difficult areas, the Bench said.
