Government Medical College and Hospital not to appeal against SC decision on UT pool seats

Published on: 26th May 2018

On Friday, GMCH-32 Director Principal B S Chavan told Chandigarh Newsline that the institute would now go as per the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

A DAY after the Government Medical College and Hospital (GMCH), Sector 32, suffered a setback when the Supreme Court dismissed its plea against the Punjab and Haryana High Court judgment which quashed its decision to keep the UT pool seats of postgraduate degree courses reserved only for its own MBBS students, the college authorities on Friday said that they would not file an appeal in the Supreme Court in the case. “We are not inclined to interfere with the impugned judgment and order passed by the High Court. The special leave petitions are dismissed,” the Supreme Court said in the order on Thursday.

On Friday, GMCH-32 Director Principal B S Chavan told Chandigarh Newsline that the institute would now go as per the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The High Court on May 15 had directed the GMCH-32 to conduct counselling afresh for the admissions. Chavan said that GMCH will have to conduct the counselling before May 31. “As per the High Court order, it has been mentioned that out of 62 seats, 31 will go to GMCH, while the rest of the seats will go to deserving candidates. The institute is taking opinion about the deserving candidates,” he said, adding that counselling dates are also being decided by the institute.

GMCH-32 has 125 postgraduate seats — 63 seats are for All India quota and 62 are for UT Chandigarh, out of which 15 per cent are reserved for Scheduled Castes. The seats of UT pool had been kept reserved only for those students who have completed their MBBS from institutes within the city — meaning 100 per cent institutional preference for its own students under the UT pool quota.

The High Court had brought down GMCH-32’s own share to 31 from the existing 62 seats and directed it to throw the rest of 31 seats under the UT pool quota open to the other deserving candidates who have studied MBBS from other institutions.

A division bench of Justices Mahesh Grover and Rajbir Sehrawat in a judgment on May 15 had said, “To avoid merit being a casualty, it would be in the fairness of things that 50% institutional preference be restricted to 62 seats falling to the share of the institution after the remaining 50% have been consumed in the All India quota.”

Source: The Indian Express