Courts must exercise caution before interfering with Educational standards set by NMC: HC
Punjab and Haryana High Court
Chandigarh: Denying to grant relief to a group of MBBS students, who had sought relaxation in the pass percentage in their exam, the Punjab and Haryana High Court recently observed that it was a settled principle that courts should exercise utmost caution before interfering in matters of educational standards laid down by a statutory authority like the National Medical Commission (NMC), more particularly when those standards are based on considerations of public welfare and safety.
While delivering the judgement, the HC bench also reiterated that the decisions of other High Courts, particularly those supported by elaborate reasoning, may have high persuasive value, but they do not become binding precedents for courts outside their jurisdiction.
The High Court bench was considering a plea filed by MBBS students whose results were declared on August 18, 2023 and the students were seeking the benefit of the revised notification issued by the National Medical Commission (NMC) on September 01, 2023. In the said notification, it was stated that in subjects having two papers, the students must obtain a minimum of 40% marks in aggregate (both papers combined) to pass the subject.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that NMC had offered relief to the medicos by reducing the required percentage of marks from the earlier criterion to score 50% marks. Later, on October 3, 2023, the Apex Medical Commission issued a public notice stating that the benefit of reduced pass percentage, as announced in the notice dated 01.09.2023, could not be given a retrospective effect.
While considering the matter, the HC bench, after hearing the submissions, the HC bench considered the question of "whether the Notification dated 01.09.2023 is required to be applied retrospectively or prospectively, i.e. whether the changes made in the Notification dated 01.09.2023 will be applicable from 01.08.2023 or only from 01.09.2023."
The bench observed that the petitioners' counsel heavily relied on judgments passed by division benches of the Madras High Court and the Kerala High Court to argue that the issue of notification was retrospective.
However, the Punjab and Haryana High Court observed that the nuanced situation relating to the inter-relationships between the judgments of High Courts in different jurisdictions needed to be understood in the structural context.
The bench reiterated that even though the decisions of other High Courts, particularly those supported by elaborate reasoning, may have high p-ersuasive value, they do not become binding precedents for courts outside their jurisdiction.
At this outset, the HC bench comprising Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sumit Goel observed, "While a decision by the High Court, particularly one delivered after detailed analysis and reasoned interpretation, may enjoy high persuasive authority, it does not operate as a precedent in the sense of binding on other High Courts."
The High Court observed that ever High Court was competent to interpret and apply the law within its territorial limits and while doing so, it may adopt an approach different from that of another High Court.
"At the same time, it cannot be overlooked that if the law is thrown into a state of uncertainty due to conflicting deadlocks, it would lose all its utility and, therefore, it is necessary that one High Court records its dissent along with the reasons therefor, while suspending the view taken by other High Courts," Justice Goel remarked, Live Law has reported.
Therefore, the Court explained that the decision of another High Court had to be taken into consideration and dissent had to be recorded only after recording the reasons including the reasons for not following the persuasive value of the decision of another High Court.
Referring to the chain of judgments, the Court observed that "the decision of one High Court is not a binding precedent for another High Court. The doctrine of stare decisis does not make the decisions of one High Court binding precedent in respect of other High Courts."
Further, the bench observed that by exaggerating the doctrine of stare decisis to any extent, decisions of one High Court could not be given the status of binding precedent in respect of other High Courts and any such attempts would also be contrary to the doctrine of stare decisis and the directions laid down by the Supreme Court, which had interpreted its scope and ambit.
It clarified that it was not at all relevant that whether there is only one decision of a High Court on a particular point or different High Courts have taken similar views. According to the bench, whatever the conclusion, the decisions cannot have the force of a binding precedent on other High Courts.
"Such demiurgic status is reserved only for judgments of the Hon'ble Supreme Court, which are binding on all courts in the country by virtue of Article 141 of the Constitution. This distinction arises from the federal character of the Indian judiciary, where each High Court exercises jurisdiction over a defined territorial area and is a court of record under Article 215 of the Constitution," observed the HC bench.
Regarding the present case, the court deferred to the view taken by the Division Bench of the Kerala High court in the case of National Medical Commission v. Anyony P. Alappatt & Ors. and the order of the Madras HC Division bench giving retrospective effect to the NMC Notification in Controller of Examinations, Pondicherry University, Pondicherry v. Megha Maria Jo & Ors.
The bench, in this case, gave detailed reasoning while suspending the decisions of the both High Courts mainly relying on the public notice issued on October 3, 2023, which clarified that the notification cannot be implemented retrospectively.
Regarding the Kerala HC order, the bench said that the judgment "did not take into account that the course in question pertains to the field of medicine, namely, the MBBS programme, which, by its very nature, is a highly specialised and professional discipline. In such a sensitive field, high qualifying standards are mandated not only to serve individual aspirations but also to protect the larger public interest."
It said that it was settled principle that the courts should exercise utmost caution before interfering in matters of educational standards laid down by a statutory authority like the NMC, more particularly when those standards are based on considerations of public welfare and safety.
"Individual difficulties, no matter how sympathetic, cannot outweigh the collective good, which requires strict professional standards," observed the bench, whole dismissing the petition.
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