NRI quota seats: HC directive to private medical colleges, MCI

The Madras High Court on Friday directed 10 private medical colleges in Tamil Nadu to submit details of admissions made under the non-resident Indian (NRI) quota.

Giving the interim direction on an appeal which alleged 207 unfilled NRI quota seats had been sold for huge sums without applying merit, it also directed the Medical Council of India to file an affidavit explaining the process for filling vacant seats.

During the hearing, a bench comprising Justice N Kirubakaran and Justice P Velmurugan orally observed whether there was any possibility bring a rule for giving preference to students who studied in government schools for admission in government medical colleges.

Appellant S Dheeran of Coimbatore challenged the order of a single Judge bench dismissing his petition for a direction to the state government to undertake proper counselling and mop-up procedure to fill up the 207 management quota seats that have become available owing to non-filling of NRI quota seats.

The bench directed the 10 private medical colleges to furnish a list of candidates along with their marks and the procedures followed by the colleges to admit them under the NRI quota.

When the counsel for Dheeran submitted the entire issue has arisen because the MCI has not laid down any separate schedule for filling up the NRI quota, the court directed the MCI to file an affidavit explaining its stand on it.

The counsel said as per the judgement of the Supreme Court, the state government should have conducted manual counselling for allotment of the seats remaining vacant.

However, the 207 seats under the NRI quota remained vacant and without conducting manual counselling, the state returned them to the managements, which had filled them up allegedly without following merits and for huge sums, the counsel alleged.

About 260 seats were earmarked under the NRI quota, of which only 53 were filled up.