The Supreme Court of India has pronounced its reason on the judgement on Other Backward Class (OBC) and Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) quota in PG all India quota (AIQ) seats (MBBS/BDS and MD/MS/MDS) case today, January 20. The special bench of justices -- Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice AS Bopanna earlier on January 7 upheld the centre's decision to implement 27 per cent OBC reservation in AIQ PG medical seats.
Justifying the reason to allow 27 per cent reservation criteria, the top court also said that merit should be socially contextualised and merit cannot be reduced to narrow definitions of performance in open competitive exams.
The capabilities and potential of an individual, the Supreme Court said, are also shaped by lived experiences, social, economic and cultural advantages that certain classes have and contribute to their success and privilege plays a role in getting advantages.
Reservation, the top court noted, is not at odds with merit but furthers it is a distributive impact.
“Centre was not required to seek a permission of this court before granting reservation in AIQ seats and thus their decision was correct. It cannot be argued that the rules of games were set when the dates of the exam had been decided,” the top court said today.
The Court also pronounced its reason for not allowing new criteria for EWS reservation and retaining old one instead for current academic year. The Court will evaluate the new criteria in third week of March, for subsequent academic years.
“This is because the argument of petitioners about the validity of EWS was not limited to the share in number of seats in All India quota,” the Supreme Court said. The petitioners also questioned the basic criteria (income level threshold).
The bench of justices pronounced their judgement after hearing petitions challenging the centre's July 29 notification for implementing 27 per cent OBC and 10 per cent reservation in all India quota of NEET UG and NEET PG.
“We have upheld the constitutional validity of 27 percent reservation for obc in NEET PG AND UG. For EWS this year the 10 percent will apply for this year and the prospective ruling will be decided on a final EWS hearing to be held by third week of March, 2022,” Justice DY Chandrachud had said on January 7.
The NEET PG counselling for the 50 per cent AIQ seats in underway. While the registration and choice filling against Round 1 is over, the NEET PG counselling round 1 result is yet to be declared and is scheduled to be declared on January 22. There will be three more rounds of NEET PG counselling. Round 2 will take place from February 3 to 19, the mop-up round from February 24 to March 10 and the stray vacancy round between March 11 and March 16.
