Telangana High Court ditches surrendering PG Medical Diploma seats

The Telangana High Court on Friday suspended the decision taken by the Medical Council of India (MCI), Government of Telangana and the Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences (KNRUHS) to surrender the Post Graduate Diploma Seats for the academic year 2020-21, for which usually in-service candidates are preferred.

The decision will affect the selection criteria for PG Medical Diploma in all government and private institutions of the State. It upset many in-service professionals who wished to upgrade their skills. P Bhavana, an aspirant for PG Diploma in medical radio diagnosis, filed a petition in the HC to quash the decision taken by the MCI, State and KNRUHS authorities. Hearing the petition by the division bench comprising Justice M S Ramachandra Rao and Justice T Amarnath Goud quashed the order issued by MCI and directed them to continue with the old practice of giving preference to the in-service doctors for the courts of Post Graduate Diploma. The division bench said it was aware there were very few seats where preference was given to the in-service doctors. If the decision of authorities was allowed to be executed, then it would deny the opportunity to in-service candidates to upgrade their skills, it observed. The Bench stated that this decision of MCI was arbitrary and unreasonable and violative of Article 14 and Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. "This decision will only help the private institutions which deprive the poor of getting facilities from the government," it castigated. The Bench also took judicial notice of the fact that recently the Telangana admissions and fee regulatory authority doubled the tuition fee from Rs 3.8 lakh to Rs 7.6 lakh per year. It was notified last week, it said.

The Bench issued notices to the Union government, State government and the Health University apart from impleading the principals of Kakatiya Medical College, Warangal, Kamineni Medical College, Gandhi Medical College Secunderabad, Prathima Medical College Karimnagar and MNR Medical College as respondents. The Bench directed the respondents to file counter-affidavits and the case was adjourned to June 1.