Bedi purposely blocking govt quota for medical courses: Puducherry CM

PUDUCHERRY: Chief Minister of Puducherry V Narayanasamy on Sunday alleged that Lieutenant Governor Kiran Bedi was blocking 10 per cent horizontal reservation for government school students in medical courses.

The allegation comes a day after Bedi announced that she had referred to Union Home Ministry the proposal of territorial government to provide the quota.

Narayanasamy told a virtual press conference that he had convened a joint meeting of leaders of all political parties on Monday to decide on the next course of action to ensure implementation of the reservation.

He alleged that the Lt Governor had been impeding implementation of all proposals of the elected government only to tarnish its image.

"Now, the proposal of the government to provide horizontal reservation of 10 per cent is being blocked by Bedi who is delaying its implementation by referring it to the Union Ministry," he said.

She deliberately acts to the detriment of the students and other sections of people through her intervention, he alleged.

The government had intended to help students from rural areas, who had done plus-two courses in government schools and cleared the NEET and the 10 per cent quota was, therefore, sought to be introduced through a decision of the cabinet recently, he said.

"We forwarded the file relating to the cabinet decision to Lt Governor for approval. But Kiran Bedi had blocked the implementation of the proposal particularly when counselling was to be held shortly for admission to MBBS and other medical courses," Narayansamy said.

"The Lt Governor has been hatching a conspiracy to block the government`s proposals on various issues and now she has adopted the same conspiracy in implementing the horizontal reservation for government school students," he said.

He charged Bedi with functioning like the agent of the Bharatiya Janata party and was dashing to pieces the dreams of the poor students aspiring to do medical courses by referring the proposal to the Home Ministry.

Narayanasamy further said he had asked the District Collector to go into the allegations that students who did not belong to Puducherry had been earmarked seats in the MBBS course in the centrally administered JIPMER on the basis of alleged fake certificates of nativity of Puducherry.

The Chief Minister said he had received complaints that students from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had allegedly been selected for the MBBS course in JIPMER on the basis of fake certificates that they were from Union Territory. The Collector would conduct a detailed enquiry and take appropriate decision, he said.

President of Puducherry Parents and Students Welfare Association V Bhala had also alleged that bogus nativity certificates were submitted by students from other states in getting admission under Puducherry quota in MBBS courses at JIPMER. He wanted the government to hold a probe into the matter.