Coming across a rare case of an MBBS graduate, registered with the Tamil Nadu Medical Council, who chose to render service as a Vocational Instructor-Nursing instead of a doctor, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court dismissed the appeal preferred by the State challenging a single bench order that had directed the government to take up his request for regularisation. He had attained superannuation in 2009.
A.C. Kumar of Tirunelveli originally graduated in B.Sc (Chemistry) in 1970. He joined MBBS and completed the course in 1978. He was also registered with Tamil Nadu Medical Council. Since he was interested in teaching, he applied for the post of part-time Vocational Instructor to teach vocational students in nursing.
He was also selected by the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission for the post of Civil Assistant Surgeon but instead he decided to join as the part-time Vocational Instructor in 1984.
He was appointed as double part-time Vocational Instructor-Nursing and continued in service till superannuation in 2009. He requested the authorities to regularise his service as a Vocational Instructor. As his request was not considered, he filed a petition before the High Court in 2010. The court in 2016 granted the relief in his favour.
The State appealed against the order of the single bench, stating that he did not have the qualification of B.Sc. (Nursing) and he had obtained an MBBS degree from Andhra University which was not equivalent to the MBBS degree issued by the University of Madras as per a Government Order.
Dismissing the appeal preferred by the State, a Division Bench of Justices T. S. Sivagnanam and S. Ananthi observed that they were pleasantly surprised to note that the man who had completed MBBS course chose to serve as a Vocational Instructor-Nursing.
“It is one of the rarest of rare cases where a person who has completed his MBBS degree thought fit to serve in a post which is much inferior to which he is eligible to apply and get selected and we have no doubt in our mind that such unique cases will never arise in future,”, the judges observed. The judges said there was no grounds to interfere with the single bench order and directed the State to comply with the order within three months.
