Madras High Court (File photo | EPS)
MADURAI: Calling the denial of medical admission to an eligible differently-abled aspirant as ‘arbitrary’ and ‘unfair’, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court recently directed the State Health Department to pay Rs 2-lakh cost to the aspirant.
Justice G R Swaminathan noted that the petitioner G Arun Kumar had applied for admission to MBBS course under the differently-abled category for the year 2018-2019. But he was not granted admission as the selection committee disputed his disability certificate.
Kumar filed a petition before the court in that regard in 2018, and pursuant to the court’s direction in 2019, a fresh board was constituted and the board confirmed that Kumar was a differently-abled person. Since the academic year, for which admission was sought, had expired, the court had directed the authorities to consider granting admission to Kumar in the next year.
But Kumar’s application was not considered next year as well and he filed a contempt petition to which the authorities answered that NEET marks obtained in previous year cannot be used to seek admission in the subsequent year. Hence he filed a separate petition in August 2019 but the same could not be taken for disposal till January 6, 2021.
Justice Swaminathan observed that Kumar had been ‘unfairly’ denied seat and had to move the court thrice. Though Kumar is found to be meritorious, the Supreme Court authorises the court for direct admission of a candidate only in the succeeding year (next academic year) which would be 2019-2020 in the petitioner’s case. Hence the court cannot give any direction for admission at this stage, the judge pointed out. But he directed the authorities to pay `2-lakh cost to Kumar for arbitrarily denying seat to him and wished him good luck in achieving his dream in the next academic year.
