Meritorious SC/ST/OBC/EWS candidates entitled to general quota: SC

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has said on that eligible students belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Backward Reservation categories should be given admission in the general category on merit. This crucial judgment by the top court has cancelled the action of denying MBBS admission in the general category to a student belonging to a reserved category in Madhya Pradesh.

The court quashed on Tuesday the judgment of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, which had upheld the illegal procedure last year, and directed OBC category candidate Rinku Kushwaha to be given MBBS admission in the general category for the academic year 2024-25. The position of the Madhya Pradesh Medical Department was that the five per cent seat reserved for general category candidates in MBBS admission would not be given to an OBC student who has studied in government schools and is qualified on merit. Questioning this, the candidate approached the High Court, but his petition was rejected.

A bench comprising justices BR Gavai and KK Viswanathan stated that it is a law established by the Supreme Court’s past judgments that students belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and backward sections should be given admission on the basis of their merit in the quota for non-reserved general categories. The bench reminded that a reserved category applicant should not only be given a seat in the general category if he has qualifying marks on merit but such a person should not be counted as an admission under the reserved quota.

In the judgment written by Justice BR Gavai, it was pointed out that the petitioner belonging to the reserved category was denied MBBS admission despite securing higher marks than those admitted in the general category. The cut-off marks fixed for the general category are lower than the cut-off marks for scheduled caste, scheduled tribe and OBC. Therefore, the denial of admission to the OBC category is illegal and illogical.

The court observed that the reason for the denial of seats was the mistake made in the allotment of seats in the general category and the reserved category. Due to this, many candidates with lower marks than the reserved category were admitted to MBBS in the unreserved general category. Justice Gavai stated in the judgment that this action is contrary to the judgment issued by the Supreme Court in the Sourav Yadav case and that the denial of admission of a qualified student belonging to the reserved category to the general category cannot be legally sustained.