Karnataka High Court refuses to regularise illegal medical admissions, directs action against two colleges

A division bench comprising Justices DK Singh and Venkatesh Naik T said that the admissions of four postgraduate students are illegal and the medical colleges have to be punished accordingly.

Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court has refused to regularise the illegal admission of four postgraduate medical students and directed the National Medical Commission (NMC) to take appropriate action against two colleges; Kanachur Institute of Medical Sciences, Mangaluru and KVG Medical College and Hospital, Sullia.

The petitions were filed by the students; Tisa Robinson (Thrissur, Kerala) for Pathology, Ashish Appasaheb Patil (Kolhapur, Maharashtra) for Radiology, and Hemanth Kumar P (Thiruvallur, Kerala) for Orthopaedic course, admitted by the Kanachur Institute while Nishanth GV from Bengaluru was admitted to for Orthopaedic course by the KVG College.

The students challenged the March 11, 2024 communication by the Karnataka Examinations Authority (KEA) stating that the admissions were not in terms of the guidelines of the Postgraduate Medical Education Regulation, 2023 (PGMER).

In response to the petitions, Kanachur Institute submitted that it had surrendered two seats, one each in Radiology and Orthopaedics, to the KEA. It further said that since the KEA did not include the petitioners in the counselling, they were admitted.

In so far as the Pathology seat, the college contended that the admission was made against an unfilled seat. On its part, KVG Medical College stated that the MS (Orthopaedics) seat was given to Nishanth following the last-minute cancellation of admission by the student who was earlier admitted.

On the other hand, the counsel for the Department of Medical Education said that the Kanachur Institute submitted a letter on October 30, 2023, surrendering two seats, one in MS Orthopaedics and another MD Pathology. However, the letter was withdrawn after the seal was affixed and hence, there was no surrender of the seats. According to the counsel, the college has misled the court by falsely stating in the affidavit that it surrendered two seats.

The division bench noted that Kanachur Institute filed a false affidavit stating that it surrendered the two seats on October 30, 2023. The court further said that no admission to a postgraduate course by any medical college could be regularised if it was not made through the counselling process.

The bench directed the National Medical Commission (NMC) to take appropriate action against the two colleges for illegally admitting the students to postgraduate medical courses.