Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Tuesday, December 17, invalidated recent amendments made by the state government regarding the local status of candidates for admission into postgraduate medical courses.
The ruling was delivered by a bench comprising Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice J Srinivas Rao, who stated that candidates who completed their MBBS, BAMS, or BHMS degrees from institutions in Telangana or defined “local areas” under the Presidential Order of 1974 are eligible to participate in the counselling process for the 2024-25 academic year
About 100 writ petitions challenging the amendments introduced on October 28 were filed with the High Court, which altered existing rules governing local candidate eligibility.
The court gave this verdict in response to these petitions.
2021 regulations
Prior to these amendments, Rule VIII of the 2021 regulations allowed candidates who graduated from medical institutions in designated local areas to be classified as local candidates.
However, the new rules stipulated that those admitted under a non-local quota for their undergraduate studies would not qualify as local candidates for postgraduate admissions.
The court emphasized that according to paragraph 4 of the Presidential Order, residency in a local area for at least four years before taking the qualifying examination should qualify a candidate as local. The amended rules contradicted this provision by disqualifying candidates based solely on their admission status in undergraduate programs.
The judges dismissed claims that these changes were made during the ongoing admission process, reinforcing that the amendments were not legally valid.
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