'No undue sympathy', SC quashes admissions of 7 PG dental students

The Supreme Court has quashed the admission of seven students in postgraduate courses in Dental Sciences in 2018, saying the undue sympathy with them would lead to perpetuating the illegality and giving premium to them.

Maintaining that the backdoor admissions cannot be justified, the top court declined to accept the request from the colleges and the students to permit them to continue the course or to declare their results as they have completed their studies.

“Once it is found that the respective original writ petitioners were granted admissions illegally and their admissions are backdoor, thereafter to allow them to continue their course shall be perpetuating the illegality,” a bench of Justices M R Shah and M M Sundresh said.

Referring to the law laid down by the top court in previous judgement, the court said the plea on behalf of the institutions/students to allow them to complete their course is not required to be accepted as “the undue sympathy would lead to perpetuating the illegality and giving premium to the students who got admissions illegally”.

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The top court said even if on the last date of admission, seats remained vacant there was no ground by the institutions/colleges to grant admissions unilaterally and that too without intimating the vacant seats to the Directorate of Medical Education, Raipur, Chhattisgarh.

The bench said nothing is on record that any other students were given any opportunity to apply for admissions in the respective institutions/colleges for admission on the seats that remained vacant.

“It is not appreciable how the original writ petitioners came to know that at 4:30 p.m. on May 31, 2018, the seats have remained vacant in the institutions/colleges. The only inference can be that the institutions and the students were hands in glove and the students got admissions illegally," the bench noted.

The bench allowed the appeal of the Dental Council of India and set aside the interim order of the Chhattisgarh High Court.

Dentist Sailendra Sharma and six others were not allotted PG seat in the mop round. However, they were given admission in the PG courses after the expiry of the deadline. The authorities concerned came out with an official communication annulling the admissions, which was challenged in the high court. The Dental Council of India moved the apex court challenging the high court order.

In its judgement, the bench said in the mop up round of counselling, the original writ petitioners did participate but could not secure admission on merits in the respective colleges/institutions in which subsequently they got admissions through backdoor.

The submission on behalf of the private institutions and even the students that they were meritorious and the merit is not given go bye cannot be accepted, the bench said.

The bench said it is required to be noted that all the original writ petitioners continued their studies/course pursuant to the interim order passed by the high court, even as the state government promptly took a decision to annul/cancel their admissions on the ground that their admissions were absolutely illegal.

“The High Court ought not have passed such an interim order directing to grant admissions or continue with admission/course. The interim order passed by the High Court is not legally sustainable. As per the settled position of law, nobody can be permitted to take the advantage of the order passed by the Courts,” the bench said.