Admission sans CET: HC fines 3 dental colleges Rs 8.10 cr

The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday ordered three dental colleges to deposit Rs 10 lakh per student for admitting 81 students to the Bachelor of Dental Surgery (BDS) courses without being assessed by the Common Entrance Test (CET). The total money, which comes up to Rs 8.10 crore, will be transferred to the state Covid Relief Fund, the court ordered.

The bench also directed the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences to accord ex post facto approval to the admissions after the students file affidavits with an undertaking to render one year rural service in the state.

A division bench comprising Justice Krishna S Dixit and Justice P Krishna Bhat partly and conditionally allowed the petitions filed by the colleges and the students.

The colleges – S Nijalingappa Institute of Dental Sciences and Research in Kalaburagi, Hyderabad Karnataka Development Education Trust’s Dental College Hospital and Research Institute and S B Patil Dental College and Hospital, both in Bidar district – and 82 students of these colleges had moved the Kalaburagi bench of the Karnataka High Court. The petitioners had challenged the action of the RGUHS denying approval to the admissions on the ground that the merits of the candidates were not adjudged in the CET.

The bench came down heavily upon the colleges terming the act as 'gross violence to the law of the land.’