The National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET), to which there is much opposition in Tamil Nadu, surprisingly played a crucial role in the Madras High Court's ruling favouring reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBC) in the All-India Quota (AIQ) medical/dental seats in State government-run colleges.
AIQ in non-central institutions was a creation of the Supreme Court through a verdict delivered by a three-judge Bench, led by Justice P.N. Bhagwati, in Dr. Pradeep Jain’s case in 1984. The decision was reiterated in Dinesh Kumar’s case in 1986, by which time Justice Bhagwati had become the Chief Justice of India.
The 1984 verdict had condemned and declared as unconstitutional the wholesale reservation of medical and dental seats by some State governments on the basis of the domicile and resident status of the candidates in those States. The court had described it as an issue of great national importance affecting admissions to medical colleges.
“We find that today, the integrity of the nation is threatened by the divisive forces of regionalism, linguism and communalism. Regional, linguistic and communal loyalties are gaining ascendancy in national life and seeking to tear apart and destroy national integrity. We tend to forget that India is one nation, and we are all Indians first and Indians last.
“Now, if India is one nation, and if there is only one citizenship, namely citizenship of India…it is difficult to see how a citizen having a permanent home in Tamil Nadu or speaking the Tamil language can be regarded as an outsider in Uttar Pradesh, and/or [how] a citizen having a permanent home in Maharashtra [can] be regarded as an outsider in Karnataka,” the court had said.
Impressing upon the need for selecting meritorious students for medical education through an all-India examination, the Supreme Court had ordered that at least 30% of the seats in State government-run medical colleges should be filled through AIQ. Later, the figure was finalised at 15% of the seats in undergraduate courses and 50% in postgraduate courses.
Since then, AIQ seats in non-central institutions were being filled without any communal reservation until the Supreme Court, in 2009, ordered grant of reservation for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Dr. Saloni Kumar had filed a case in 2015, seeking reservation for OBCs too under the quota. The plea is pending in the apex court.
Now, opposing a batch of cases filed by the Government of Tamil Nadu and a host of political parties in the Madras High Court seeking reservation for OBCs in those seats, the Medical Council of India contended that neither the State government nor the Centre could provide such reservation.
The Council claimed that even the High Court was not competent to order the provision of such reservation, since the quota was created by the Supreme Court purely for meritorious students.
Rejecting the contention, Chief Justice Amreshwar Pratap Sahi and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy wrote: “Merit has now been taken care of by NEET, and therefore, no candidate other than [one] who qualifies the examination can be granted admission, and therefore, also, the seats belong only to those who compete and qualify, proving their eligibility and merit in the examination.”
As far as their competency to decide on the issue was concerned, the judges pointed out that it was the Supreme Court which had directed the present petitioners to approach the High Court for determining whether OBCs were entitled to reservation in the quota under question. After ordering the constitution of an expert committee to finalise the terms of OBC reservation from the next academic year, the High Court made it clear that any of the parties to the present litigation could approach the Supreme Court if they require any clarification. To be on guard, the DMK on Tuesday filed a caveat before the apex court.
