SC seeks Centre's reply on Azam Khan's plea on medical college

The Supreme Court today sought response of the Centre on a plea seeking quashing of a Union health ministry order disapproving setting up of a medical college by a trust run by Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan at Rampur in Uttar Pradesh.
A bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and S K Kaul issued notice to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the Medical Council of India (MCI) and sought their response within three weeks.
The court was hearing the plea filed by Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar Trust through Khan, its chairman, against the government's May 31 order denying permission to establish his college Jauhar Institute of Medical Sciences in Rampur.

Senior advocate S G Hasnain, appearing for the trust, said that the college was disapproved by the government after a surprise inspection by the MCI officials on January 6 allegedly revealed there was no faculty in the institute.
It was a Friday and being a Muslim minority institute, it was a weekly off, the trust said in its plea, adding that the permission has wrongly been denied.
It alleged that the under secretary of the ministry did not consult the Oversight Committee, which was set up by the Supreme Court in 2016 to look after the policy decisions of the MCI before passing the May 31 order against it.

"The impugned order has been passed in a very hush-hush manner and in a most arbitrary and discriminatory manner," the petition said.