HC orders govt to consider plea for offline PG med counselling

The High Court on Thursday directed the Medical Education department to come up with a proposal, within four weeks, to ensure hassle-free counselling for postgraduate medical students.

The direction was issued during the hearing of a petition filed by Noothana and 96 other medical students seeking directions to allow them to attend offline counselling after selecting the college of their choice in the online counselling.

Principal Secretary to Medical Education department, M Lakshminarayana, who appeared before the court, submitted that offline counselling was not allowed for students who select seats online only to check sale of medical seats. He said that the waiting list for medical seats had been understood differently.

Around 200 seats are available for online counselling while there are 300-odd seats for offline counselling. A bench of Justices N Kumar and B Sreenivase Gowda directed the Medical Education department to come up with the proposal to ensure postgraduate medical students face no problems during counselling from next year.  The Bench directed the government to consider the students’ application and adjourned the matter by four weeks.

Interim stay refused

The High Court has refused to grant interim relief to Ritu Primlani, a member of an NGO who has been raising funds in US using the name of environmentalist Salumarada Thimmakka.

Ritu had approached the Court seeking quashing of a complaint registered against her by the Ramanagara police. She had contended that she was only a member of the NGO and had nothing to do with the funds raised in the name of Salumarada Thimmakka.

Environmental Education Trust, a Delhi-based NGO, has raised crores of rupees holding various programmes in the name of Salumarada Thimmakka.  Through the Internet, Thimmakka found out that her name had been misused and she lodged a complaint with the Ramanagara police.  The police filed an FIR and Ritu was arrested at the Delhi airport. She is now out on bail now.   Justice A N Venugopala Gowda refused to grant interim relief and adjourned the next hearing to July 1.