Karnataka High Court stays second round of counselling for PG medical seats
BENGALURU:The Karnataka High Court stayed the second round of counselling which is about to start for filling the seats of postgraduate medical courses till May 2. After hearing the petition filed by Dr Rahul Gawalkar and 31 others, a division bench of Justice B S Patil and Justice S Sunil Dutt Yadav on Friday passed the interim order directing the Karnataka Examination Authority, Directorate of Medical Education and Medical Council of India not to hold the counselling till May 2.
During the hearing, petitioners counsel Doreraj contended that if the second round of counselling is proceeded with, without awaiting reversion of seats from central government quota and put them into pool for allotment, the option for petitioners to choose the speciality of their choice gets severely affected.
On instructions from the Director of Medical Education, who is present in the court, the Additional Government Advocate Shivaprabhu S Hiremath submitted that the matter pending before the Supreme Court involving the question regarding reversion of seats of Central Government Quota is scheduled to be listed on May 1. He further submitted that based on the judgment of the Apex Court, appropriate action in accordance with law would be taken and until then the second round of counselling would be deferred.
The court observed that though several questions are raised in the writ petitions, “We are of the view that seat sharing arrangement made by publishing seat matrix by the state government prima facie cannot be upset at this stage because the first round of counselling has already been completed and the process of second round of counselling is about to commence”.
However, the grievance made by the petitioners that without the leftover seats from the Central Government Quota put into pool for allotment through second round of counselling, the option of petitioners for different subjects of their choice would be minimised or reduced, has to be taken note of.