CHENNAI: Expressing anguish over the rampant commercialisation of medical education and denying admission to a rightful candidate, the Madras High Court ordered the concerned institute and the government authorities who failed to take appropriate action to pay a compensation of Rs. 15 lakhs to the candidate.
A division bench of Justices R Subramanian and R Kalaimathi passed the orders recently on an appeal filed by Dr P Sidharthan who was denied admission to a post-graduate course in general medicine by the Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) in 2017 despite being allotted the seat under the government quota.
The bench found that the action of the PIMS, to say the least, ‘reprehensible’ and held the institute and the officials of the Central Admission Committee (CENTAC) responsible for denying the admission.
“We are of the opinion that the petitioner is at least entitled to a monetary compensation, which we fix at Rs.15 lakh. Of this, the respondent college will pay Rs. 10 lakh and the CENTAC Rs. 5 lakh for its inaction,” the bench ordered.
It directed the respondents to pay the amount in four weeks.
The case of the petitioner is that he was serving as an assistant surgeon with the government of Puducherry and took the first-ever National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) in 2017.
He was allotted a seat in M.S (general surgery) in the PIMS 2017 but the institute denied him admission citing failure to pay the fee (which was fixed higher than what was fixed by govt) on time and failure to execute a bond for compulsory service for a year after completion of the course.
After sending representations to the concerned authorities of the government, Sidharthan filed two writ petitions which were later dismissed prompting him to file the appeal.
The PIMS, while denying him the seat, admitted another candidate in violation of a court order to keep the seat vacant.
During arguments before the division bench, advocate VBR Menon, appearing for the petitioner, contended that the writ court had committed complete error in dismissing the writ petitions overlooking the fact that 50% of total seats are to be filled by the State government in private medical colleges.
He also pointed out that a private institution cannot insist upon the execution of the compulsory bond from a government servant who was allotted the seat since he is required to work in government service after completion of the study.
The court held the view that the denial of admission was ‘illegal’ and that the fact that the petitioner was able to secure a seat in a different institution would not absolve PIMS of its liability to compensate him for the injustice that has been committed to him.
Quoting a couplet from Tirukkural saying that letters and numbers (education) are equated to the eyes of a person, the bench said it is rather unfortunate that the ‘eyes have been made a commercial commodity’, which can be acquired at a very high cost.
“We hope and expect that the National Medical Commission takes appropriate action to prevent the recurrence of such aberrations at the instance of private educational Institutions”, the judges said.