NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday rejected a plea seeking directions to cancel the All India quota (AIQ) round 3 of NEET-PG 2024 counselling and to conduct it afresh. The court dismissed the plea after being apprised by the counsel appearing for the National Medical Commission (NMC) that any such direction now will have a cascading effect in all the states.
A two-judge bench of the apex court, comprising Justices BR Gavai and K Vinod Chandran, passed the order and refused to entertain a batch of pleas filed in the case.
“The plea has no merits. We are sorry. We are not inclined to hear,” the bench said. The NMC’s lawyer said that if anything in the case has to be done now, “it will have a cascading effect in all the states because students have already taken part in the counseling.”
Earlier, after hearing the petition filed by a batch of students seeking fresh counselling, the top court had issued a notice to the Central government, NMC and others, asking them to file their respective replies.
The petitioners, who are eligible for the NEET-PG 2024 counselling, said round 3 of the AIQ counselling for NEET-PG started before round 2 of the counselling was concluded in certain states.
The plea said when the state round 2 counselling opened, they had an option to choose the best option, and leave the AIQ seat if they were getting a better seat in the state round of counselling.
“This created a grave prejudice to the petitioners and similarly placed candidates since they were deprived of the seats that were blocked by the candidates from the states whose round 2 did not commence earlier,” the plea said.
The plea said blocking of the seats led to a situation in which many meritorious eligible candidates ended up losing the seat. It alleged that the act of respondents were inconsistent with the schedule of NEET-PG counselling laid down by the apex court.
The application process for the NEET-UG began on Friday and will conclude on March 7. In 2024, a record more than 24 lakh candidates took the exam. The NTA conducts the NEET every year for admission into medical colleges. A total of 1,08,000 seats are available for MBBS course. About 56,000 of them are in government and 52,000 in private colleges.
Also in top court
Ex-Army officer’s PIL dismissed
The apex court on Friday refused to entertain a PIL filed by a former Panchkula-based Army officer, Manish Bhatnagar, who alleged lapses on Army’s part in acting on information related to Pakistan’s incursions before the 1999 Kargil war. “What happened in the 1999 war is the internal matter relating to executive decision,” the bench said.
‘All pleas from 1 FIR must go to 1 bench’
The top court on Friday said all bail applications stemming from one FIR should go before the same judge or bench in high courts to ensure consistency of opinions. A bench of Justices BR Gavai and K Vinod Chandran referred to a July 2023 order, which said it was appropriate for all matters from one FIR to go before the same judge of a high court.