New Delhi: The Supreme Court directed the Centre to notify foreign medical aspirants about their admission status in government colleges by August 15 starting this year.
The Apex court took serious note of delay in communication to medical students from foreign countries, the court asked Centre to give the students time to join, Indiatoday reports.
Last date for admission in the first year of MBBS:
The Court noted that despite the last date for admissions in to MBBS first year courses is August 31 the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has intimated students from Iran, Bhutan and Nepal about their admissions at the “eleventh hour”, on August 30 which in turn resulted in denial of seats to them.
The bench comprising of Justices L Nageshwara Rao and Hemant Gupta allowed the foreign students and the north-eastern states students to take admissions in the MBBS courses and also said that a similar situation arose even last year and the apex court had to intervene to help the students.
Here’s what the bench said:
“In a similar situation that arose last year, we had to come to the rescue of the students who were intimated about their admission in the medical colleges at the eleventh hour. To avoid inconvenience being caused to the students who are sponsored by other countries and the state governments and the Union Territories in whose favour seats are allocated, we direct the Government of India to intimate the concerned authorities of the state governments, the Union Territories and other countries about the approval of admissions to candidates whose names are sponsored, at least 15 days before the last date of admission,” the bench said.
The Students moved the Apex court after they missed their college admission last date despite being granted admissions from the central pool in the government colleges but failed to secure the seats since the MEA notified them late.
Advocate Dushyant Parashar, appearing for All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) said that seven seats were earmarked to the premier medical institute for enrolling foreign students.
But these students could only report to the institute by September 2, AIIMS could not enrol them in the first year MBBS courses as the apex court had fixed August 31 of every year as the deadline for admissions.
“The students reported to the Medical Colleges immediately thereafter on September 1 and 2. They were refused admission on the ground that the last date for admission, as approved by this Court in Ashish Ranjan versus Union of India, expired on August 31, 2019,” it said.
Noting the MEA delayed the communication, the top court said that no fault can be found on the part of students for not reporting before the last date as they have rushed immediately after they were informed about the admission in the government medical colleges.
“Therefore, we are of the opinion that the last date as fixed by this Court in Ashish Ranjan case needs to be relaxed in favour of the writ petitioners,” the bench said.