Kerala High Court Comes To The Rescue Of NEET Candidate; Holds Night Hearing To Grant Time Extension To Submit A Document

The Kerala High Court on Thursday held yet another night hearing at 9 pm to attend a matter where a NEET candidate sought an extension of time to file his documents. This is the second night hearing this week.

Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan granted an interim order in favour of the petitioner noting that the student is a meritorious candidate and that he was at the risk of losing a seat merely because he had failed to produce the original of a document. 

The candidate had appeared for NEET in Kozhikode and had secured a good rank. He was thereafter issued an offer letter from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Bhubaneswar.

All the documents relating to the same were produced before the Court today. 

He was asked to personally appear at the Institute on or before 27th January. Accordingly, he reached the institute on the 25th with all the records, but they found that the original mark list from the first year was not produced and that only a copy was submitted. 

Advocate P.P. Biju appeared for the petitioner contended that although on that day, the Dean had granted time till February to produce the original mark list, he received a call today morning from the office indicating that his admission will be cancelled if he does not produce the documents before 5 pm today.

The petitioner immediately booked a flight to Bhubaneswar, but he can only reach there by tomorrow 1 pm. Therefore, he approached the court seeking a day's time to submit his documents. 

Central Government Counsel Daya Sindhu Shreehari and ASGI appeared for the respondents and vehemently opposed the plea. They also pointed out that the issue of jurisdiction also arises in this case. 

However, the Court was inclined to grant an interim order noting as follows: 

"The petitioner is a meritorious student as I can infer from the records. He has already been given admission, to deny him a seat based on this single document would be a grave mistake."

Accordingly, the Judge granted him time till 5 pm tomorrow to submit his original consolidated mark list. The petitioner was also directed to send a copy of this order via mail to the respondents.

The matter will be taken up tomorrow at 11 am again. 

Earlier this week, Justice Devan Ramachandran had held a hearing at 11 PM in an admiralty suit.