Plea in Bombay HC Challenges MBBS Seat Allotment

Mumbai: The Bombay High Court is considering a plea challenging the seat allotment process for the MBBS course by the State Common Entrance Test (CET) Cell.

It has been alleged in the plea that the State of Maharashtra has applied different rules for specified reservations (including hilly areas, handicaps, defence categories) and constitutional reservations. The HC Division Bench of Justices A.S. Chandurkar and Rajesh S. Patil had listed the matter for further hearing on Wednesday i.e. December 3, 2024.

The petitioner has a permanent residence in Nashik District, which is notified as a hilly and backward area by Maharashtra Government. After appearing in the National Eligibility-Entrance Test Undergraduate (NEET-UG) examination, the petitioner received a rank of 14874 in the All India Ranking and thereafter participated in the admission process for the 85% State Quota seats conducted by the State CET Cell.

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As per the latest media report by Live Law, it has been stated in the plea that as per the information brochure published by the State CET cell relating to the rules for conducting the Centralized Admission Process (CAP), every candidate is required to fill the preference form before each CAP round.

While filling the preference from Hilly Area Category and Open Category before the CAP round 1, the petitioner opted for Nair College Mumbai at serial number 5 and Government Medical College, Nagpur at serial number 8. Consequently, he was allotted a seat in the Government Medical College, Nagpur in CAP round 1 under the Hill area category.

The petitioner alleged that during CAP round 1, a candidate with AIR ranking 3649 was allotted a seat at Nair Medical College Mumbai under the HA OPEN Women category, while a candidate with AIR 7519 received the other HA OPEN seat there. Meanwhile, the petitioner opted for degradation for CAP round 2 and again filled his preference of Nair College Mumbai at Serial Number 5.

Allegedly, for CAP Round 2, the candidate having an AIR ranking 3649 was upgraded to another college. The petitioner's grievance was that instead of allotting the Nair Medical College seat to the next women candidate having AIR 7519, the State CET Cell allotted it to another candidate (respondent in this case) and retained the former in the HA OPEN category seat at Nair Medical College.

It was argued by the petitioner that had the State CET Cell allotted the candidate with AIR 7519 under HA OPEN Women category at Nair Medical College, the HA OPEN seat in the same college would have been allotted to the petitioner as per the merit, instead of the other candidate (respondent) who scored lesser marks than the petitioner.

The petitioner argued that as per Rule 9.4.9 of the Information Brochure, 30% female reservation had to be implemented by the way of parallel reservation. It was further mentioned in the petition that as per the Information Brochure, 30% parallel female reservation seats had to be filled in the first round and only after exhausting the same, general merit seats could be filled.

Therefore, the petitioner contended that as per the said rules, the female candidates should be first allotted female quota seats and only after exhausting the same, the female candidates should have been allotted the general seats. 

With this argument, the petitioner prayed to the Court to direct the State CET Cell to transfer the petitioner to Nair Medical College, Mumbai and the respondent to the Government Medical College Nagpur for the MBBS course. Further, the petitioner sought compensation from the State for not allotting him Nair Medical College, Mumbai.

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