ASHEESH PRATAP SINGH AND ORS.versusM. SACHDEVAND ORS.

A                    ASHEESH PRATAP SINGH AND ORS.
                                    v.
                         M. SAC HD EV A AND ORS.

                               DECEMBER 19, 2002

B        (S. RAJENDRA BABU AND P. VENKATARAMA REDDI, JJ.l


          ~edical Council of India Act,     1956 ·

          S. JO-A-Admission to MBBS Course-Candidates qualified in CPMT
C and for admission allocated to Azamgarh Medical College-After passing
    first professional' examination, while they· were to be admitted to second
    professional course, the College was found deficient in infrastructure and
     closed-Directions given by Supreme Court to Medical Council of India and
     Director General of Medical Education of U.P, to accommodate the. students
D    in second professional course in various Medical Colleges of U. P. as suggested
     by Directorate General of Medical Ed11cation of U.P.-However, both the
     authorities failed to work out an appropriate so/11tion and Medical Council
    of India pointed out that in view of mandatory provisions of s. JO-A no
     medical College can make admission over and above its ann11al intake
    capacity and the existing seats were already full-Held, the students wo11/d
E    be provided seats in different Colleges which would be adjusted over the lime
     by reducing the intake in the next years so that the over all strength of the
     Colleges does not get enhanced and the infrastructure is available to all the
     students within the intake allocated to ·the Colleges.

          State of Punjab v. Renuka Singh/a, 1199411SCC175, cited.
F
         CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION: Contempt Petition Civil No. 344
    of2002.

                                              IN

G         Writ Petition Civil No. 8/2001.

          (Under Article 32 of the Constitution of India.)
                                         WITH
          Contempt Petition No. 431/2002 In W.P.(C) No. 76/200 I.
H                                           552
                       A.P. SINGHv. M. SACHDEVA                           553
     Gopid Subramanium, Vishwajit Singh and Chanchal Kumar Ganguli for            A
the petitioners.

     R.N. Trivedi, Additional Soliciter General, Harish N. Salve, R.C. Verma,
Mukesh Verma, Abhishek Atrey, Ashwani Bhardwaj, S.P. Sharma, Maninder
Singh, Ms. Pratibha M. Singh, Angad Chopra and Ankur Talwar, for the
Respondents.                                                                      B
     The following Order of the Court was delivered :

      32 writ petitions had been filed before this Court by the students who
had qualified themselves in the CPMT examination held in June 1998 for
admissions to medical colleges in the State of U.P. and they were called for C
counselling for the MBBS seats available in Azamgarh Medical College run
by the All India Children Care and Education Development Society. They
deposited the necessary fees and started attending the classes from July 12,
1999 and the 1st Professional examination was held in May 2000 and all of
them have cleared their first professional. When they came to join the 2nd D
professional course, certain deficiencies in the College were noticed by the
Medical Council of India [for short 'MC') and, as direeted by this Court by
an order made on 4.5.2002 in Civil Appeal arising out of an order made by
the High Court, the said College came to be closed. In those circumstances,
this Court directed the MCI and the Directorate General of Medical Education
to accommodate the students who had been admitted in this College in E
appropriate institutions.

      Now a complaint is made before us that neither the MCI nor the
Directorate General of Medical Education have taken the necessary follow up
steps to give effect to our order.                              ·
                                                                                  F
      It is clear that these students had passed their entrance examination and
they have been allocated seats after counselling in the said College which is
now closed. It is in those circumstaoces that we made the order in question,
which is complained not to have been implemented.

       The Directorate General of Medical Education took the stand that the G
complainants before us have been studying in the second professional after
passing the first professional and, therefore, they have got to be accommodated
in the second professional in other colleges. The MCI had indicated in their
letter dated 3.4.2002 that the Migration Sub-Committee will consider the transfer
of students and that the applicants were required to complete the application H
    554                    SUPREME COURT REPORTS (2002) SUPP. 5 S.C.R.

A fonn. as per the draft application and the regulations of MCI and to send the
    same to the MCI. Certain colleges reported that· there were seats vacant in
    those colleges and the Directorate General of Medical Education proposed
    that the students be accommodated as follows:

               " ............ All the students shall be considered for accommodation
B          in the available recognised medical colleges as per the ratio of the
           admission strength on the basis of the option of merit [marks obtained
           in Ist professional] cum college. The admission strength of recognised
           colleges which was sent earlier [7 Government Aided and one private]
           has been enclosed again. The marks sheet of the Ist professional
           result of the students has been obtained from Medical College
c          Azamgarh. As per the admission strength of concerned colleges, the
           50 students of Azamgarh are proposed for transfer as per the chart
           below:

    Name of College                            Admission      Proposed No.
D                                              Strength       of seats in the ratio
                                                              of Admission
                                                              strength For the
                                                              accommodation of
                                                              50 students

E   K.G. Medical College Lucknow University         185        II

    G.S.V.M. Medical College, Kanpur                191        II

    S.N. Medical College, Agra                      123       7

F    M.L.N. Medical College, Allahabad              102       6

     L.LR.M. Medical College, Meerut                100       6

    M.L.B. Medical College, Jhansi                 50         3

     B.R.D. Medical College, Gorakhpur              50        3
G
    Santosh Medical College, Ghaziabad             50         3

                                                    851       50

          The stand of the MCI now is that no medical college in view of the
H mandatory provisions of Section 10-A of Medical Council of India Act is
                       A.P. SINGH v. M. SACHDEVA                          555
permitted to make even a single admission over and above its annual intake A
capacity and in this context reliance is placed on'the decision of State of
Punjab v. Renuka Singh/a, (1994] I SCC 175, and that neither the Directorate
General of Medical Education ofU.P. nor any other authority of the State has
approached the MCI by any application under Section 10-A of the Act for
seeking increase in the existing annual intake capacity of any of the recognised B
Government Medical Colleges in the State ofU.P. by providing proportionate
additional infrastructure and, therefore, question of granting admission must
be worked in the recognised Government Medical College for the academic
session 2002-2003 within the annual intake capacity fixed for these colleges.

      The main difficulty in this case has arisen because the students had        C
been allocated to the College after they passed their entrance examination but
that College did not have the necessary infrastructure and which came to be
closed thereafter. The authorities are squarely to be blamed in this matter in
not having ascertained the position before allocating the students to different
colleges. We gave enough time to both the MCI and the Directorate General
of Medical Education of U.P. to work out an appropriate solution in this          D
regard. They have failed to do so. On one hand, the MCI takes the stand,
as indicated above, while on the other hand, the stand of the Directorate
General of Medical Education of U.P. is that all the seats have been filled up
in the respective colleges and, therefore, it is not possible to accommodate
the students now. That way, both the MCI and the Directorate General of           E
Medical Education ofU.P. have frustrated the orders of this Court by depending
upon various provisions of the Act and the difficulty in having filled. up the
available seats in the respective colleges. It is no doubt true that the MCI
should stick to the norms fixed in its Regulations and even one time increase
cannot normally be granted. We find that when the students have already
passed the first professional, to ask the students to take the same examination   F
once again will be highly inequitable.

      In these circumstances we, direct, on the special facts of this case:

       (I)   The MCI and the Directorate General of Medical Education of
             U.P. to work out a solution in such a manner that all the students G
             be accommodated in respect of whom directions have been given
             in these matters in respective colleges in the second professional
             examination.
       (2)   The seats that have to be provided to these students shall be
             allocated in different colleges after finding out the total          H
    556                   SUPREME COURT REPORTS (2002) SUPP. 5 S.C.R.

A               infrastructure available in each of the college which shall be
                adjusted over the time by reducing the intake in the next years
                so that the overall strength of the college does not get enhanced
                and the infrastructure is available to all the students within the
                intake allocated to the college. For example, if the intake of the
                college is SO in the first year, all of them may not necessarily get
B               through to the second year and so on. With resultant vacancies,
                as long as the admissions are within the total intake of such
                college though in some year/class intake is slightly less or more,
                the MCI shall deem that its regulations have been fulfilled.
           (3) The MCI and the Directorate General of Medical of U.P. shall
c              comply with this process and make a report to this Court on
               14.012003.

         List the matter on 14.01.2003. The Director General, Medical Education
    & Training. U.P. shall be present in person on that date.

D RP.                                                          Matter is pending.