NEET-PG : Supreme Court Refuses To Entertain Disabled Candidate's Plea For Admission To Dermatology Course In PwD Quota

The Supreme Court on Wednesday refused to entertain a plea filed by a physically challenged general quota candidate seeking admission in the Master of Medicine programme in a medical college in the State of West Bengal . The matter was heard by a bench comprising CJI DY Chandrachud, Justice PS Narasimha and Justice JB Pardiwala.

As per the petitioner, the State quota had no reserved seats for disabled persons in the dermatology course. He stated that even thought there were 27 seats reserved for physically challenged candidates, there existed no physically handicapped quota for the dermatology department, which the petitioner was interested in. The petitioner submitted that this was arbitrary and discriminatory.

Per contra, the counsel for state submitted that there existed reserved seats in the All India Quota and not in the State Quota and the petitioner had not received a seat through the All India quota. The counsel submitted–

"State does not give dermatology reservations. The 27 seats were reserved for the physically handicapped. State exercises the roster power allocated the seats. Unless it is manifestly arbitrary, it cannot be interfered with. He applied under general medicine and is holding the seat."

CJI Chandrachud, while refusing to entertain the petition, stated–

"At this stage we cannot alter the reservation because there will be some other kid who would be affected. It is last minute. For the next step come back to us, we will make a committee. The approach will be very different. They will have to sit down and change the reservation. You can come next time and show us how quota seats for PWD is not properly in sync."