The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad HC stayed a single bench order for fresh MBBS counselling and allowed SC students admitted under the 70% quota to be shifted to vacant seats. The court asked UP govt to strictly follow the 21% reservation cap from next session.
Prayagraj: The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court on Thursday stopped the effect of a single judge’s earlier order, which had asked for fresh counselling for MBBS admissions in four state-run autonomous medical colleges.
The division bench, consisting of Justice Rajan Roy and Justice Manjive Shukla, said that the Scheduled Caste (SC) students who had been admitted under the disputed 70 per cent quota should instead be adjusted in other medical colleges where seats are still vacant.
This direction came while hearing a special appeal filed by the Uttar Pradesh government against the ruling of a single bench on August 28.
That earlier ruling had cancelled the 70 per cent SC quota that had been implemented in the medical colleges of Ambedkar Nagar, Kannauj, Jalaun, and Saharanpur. The single bench had also ordered that fresh counselling be conducted for admissions.
Arguing on behalf of the state, senior advocate J N Mathur explained that the government had previously supported the increased quota.
However, he pointed out that the government was now bound by the Uttar Pradesh Admission to Educational Institutions (Reservation for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes) Act, 2006. This law fixes the maximum limit of SC reservation at 21 per cent.
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Mathur further told the court that following the single bench’s order for fresh counselling would “throw the entire admission process haywire and create chaos.”
He also added that “82 SC category seats were still vacant in other colleges,” and because of this, the SC students who had been admitted under the extra quota could be shifted to those vacant seats. According to him, this would prevent uncertainty in the admission process.
The division bench agreed with this argument. It accepted the state government’s position and ordered that SC students admitted under the 70 per cent quota should be accommodated in the vacant seats available in other colleges.
The bench also clarified that the seats lying vacant in the four disputed medical colleges would not go waste. These would now be given to OBC and unreserved category candidates in the second round of counselling.
The court also directed the Uttar Pradesh government to give a written affidavit within one week. In this affidavit, the state must promise that from the next academic session onwards it will strictly follow the legal 21 per cent limit for SC reservation.
The bench warned that if the state failed to file this affidavit on time, “the benefit of its interim order would lapse.”
The court also recorded that the original petitioner, Sabra Ahmad, who belongs to the OBC category, had already received admission in Lakhimpur Kheri Medical College during the first round of counselling. She was also offered a seat in Ambedkar Nagar Medical College.
The matter will now come up again in the second week of October. By that time, the state government has to give full details of what steps it has taken to comply with the interim directions of the court.
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