Only the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes will be entitled to reservation in all-India quota (AIQ) medical seats in non-central institutions unless the Supreme Court modifies the existing procedure, the Medical Council of India told the Madras High Court on Tuesday. The Other Backward Classes (OBCs) or other categories cannot claim reservation under the quota, it said.
In written submissions made before Chief Justice Amreshwar Pratap Sahi and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy, MCI counsel V.P. Raman said the AIQ in State government-run medical colleges was a creation of the Supreme Court through its verdict in Dr. Pradeep Jain versus Union of India decided on June 22, 1984.
Then, a Bench led by Justice P.N. Bhagwati ordered creation of a purely merit-based national pool of seats instead of the entire 100% of seats in State government medical and dental colleges being allotted to locals. Subsequently, the top court modified the scheme from time to time and in 2009, it permitted reservation for the SCs/STs. At present, State governments surrender 15% of undergraduate seats and 50% of postgraduate seats to the AIQ. “Right from beginning, counselling for AIQ is held only as per Supreme Court orders. This position has continued even after the introduction of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test in 2010. Hence, any change to the scheme can only be made by the Supreme Court,” he said.
The submissions were made in reply to a batch of cases filed by political parties, individual politicians and others seeking implementation of State-specific reservation in seats contributed by the State governments to the AIQ every year.
‘Centre is willing’
Wondering how the MCI could take a stand contrary to that of the Centre, which was willing to provide reservation for OBCs with a rider that the overall reservation should not exceed 50% of the total seats in the AIQ, senior counsel P. Wilson, representing the DMK, told the court that the action of the MCI amounted to “a tail daring to wag over the head”.
In his written submissions, Additional Solicitor-General R. Shankaranarayanan stated that the Centre was willing to provide reservation to OBCs in the AIQ in non-central institutions too, provided the overall reservation did not exceed 50% of the total seats.
When the SCs/STs were being given reservation at the rate of 15% and 7.5% respectively in the AIQ seats in non-central institutions too as per the Centre’s policy, how the OBCs could be provided with as much as 50% reservation at the cost of causing much confusion, he wondered.
Rebutting the submissions, Mr. Wilson said the character of the medical and dental seats contributed by the State governments to the AIQ did not change at any point of time. Therefore, the reservation policy followed by individual States must be implemented for filling the seats contributed by them to the AIQ.
Tamil Nadu provided reservations at the rate of 50% for OBCS, 18% for SCs and 1% for STs in accordance with their population in the State. The same percentage should be applied for seats contributed by it to the AIQ. The Centre’s 27% rule for OBCs and 50% cap on overall reservations could be applied only to AIQ seats in central institutions and not to those in non-central institutes, he argued.
He also said that the Centre had been very quick in granting 10% reservations under Economically Weaker Section (EWS) quota in central institutions. When this was added to existing reservations of 27% for OBCs, 15% for SCs and 7.5% for STs, the total worked out to 59.5%. “When Centre itself grants over 50% how can it impose a cap of 50% on AIQ seats in State government colleges?” he asked.
Senior counsel AR.L. Sundaresan representing AIADMK said the State governments only contributed and didn’t surrender the medical/dental seats to AIQ. Therefore, the existing policy as formulated by the Supreme Court for the AIQ would apply only for preparing the merit list and not for applying the policy of reservations.
The AIQ seats in non-central institutions should be filled up by following State-specific reservation policy and not the Central policy, he contended.
