NEET-PG: 'How Can You Again Say She Is Female, When Petitioner Identifies As Transgender Person?' Telangana High Court Pulls Up State

The Telangana High court has pulled up the state government for not instructing the counselling authority to register a transgender doctor under the ‘third gender’ category in the NEET PG 2023 despite an earlier direction from the court. 

Last month, the high court had directed the authorities to "extend the benefit of third gender status in addition to the petitioner’s status as a “Scheduled Caste” candidate while considering her admission in any of the courses either under the central quota or under the State quota for NEET PG 2023 in a manner which is beneficial to the petitioner."

During the resumed hearing on July 20, a division bench of Justice Abhinad Kumar Shavili and Justice N. Rajeshwar Rao said:

“How can you do that? How can you again say she is female, when she identifies as a transgender? ... Despite earlier writ petition, which was disposed of following the judgement of the Supreme Court of 2014, and in spite of this Court granting interim directions, how can you again classify the petitioner as a female?"

Dr. Koyyala Ruth John Paul, the petitioner, had earlier challenged the order passed by the National Medical Committee (NMC), whereby she was denied registration and reservation under the ‘Third Gender’ quota of the NEET PG 2023 on the ground that The PG Medical Education Regulations, 2000, do not provide for gender based reservation.

Senior Counsel L. Ravichander, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, contended that despite there being clear order from the court, no steps were taken by the State or Central Government to create reservation under the ‘third gender’ in the NEET PG selections.

The court was told the Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health and Science again registered her under the ‘female’ category and also denied her reservation under the ‘transgender’ quota. 

“When you are implementing Supreme Court judgement, why are you making the person run to court twice thrice? If this kind of attitude is there, the petitioner will have to keep running around the Court and forget NEET and all those things. Not fair, no sir,” the bench observed.

Special Government Pleader, Advocate Sanjeev Kumar appearing for the State submitted that in recent past the State had issued guidelines to consider transgender individuals as “socially and economically backward class” in various sectors and requested time to get instructions regarding their implementation.

The Special GP also undertook to personally instruct the Chief Secretary of the State Counselling Authority about the court order.

Background

The petitioner appeared in the PG NEET 2023, and when counselling began, she noticed that she was placed under the ‘female’ category, despite having registered herself under the ‘Third gender’ category. Further, she was considered for reservation only under the ‘Schedule Cast’ category and not the ‘Third Gender’ category.

She contended that the National Medical Committee (NMC) had issued reservation policy, but failed to include a transgender quota. She made several representations for the inclusion of a ‘third gender ’category, relying on the guidelines as laid down in the NALSA judgement, but none of them were considered.

Feeling helpless, the petitioner approached the court through her counsel Advocate Sagarika Koneru for the first time in January, challenging her classification under the ‘female’ category and not the ‘transgender’ category.

The court ordered NMC to consider representations made by the petitioner and said appropriate orders be passed in accordance with the law laid down in NALSA judgement. The petitioner made fresh representation before the NMC. However, NMC said that since the Post Graduation Medical Education Regulations, 2000 do not provide for reservation on the basis of gender, the petitioner could not be given a seat under the ‘third gender’ quota.

The order issued by the NMC is being challenged before the court in the latest writ petition. It also seeks reservation for transgenders in terms of the decision of the Supreme Court in National Legal Services Authority v. Union of India.

 Title: Dr.Koyyala Ruth John Paul vs. Union of India