NEET is supreme, Supreme Court tells states

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that all admissions for undergraduate medical and dental courses for the academic year 2016-17 will have to be made only on the basis of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test to be conducted in July this year.

It refused to allow Tamil Nadu (which has a law to admit students on the basis of higher secondary marks), Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Gujarat, Maharashtra and others to admit students to government colleges on the basis of common entrance tests either conducted or to be conducted.

A three-judge bench of Justices Anil R. Dave, Shiva Kirti Singh and A.K. Goel also turned down the plea of several private medical colleges, deemed universities and associations of unaided private colleges to permit admission to their colleges on the basis of entrance tests conducted by them for 50 per cent seats. The bench thereby refused to modify its April 28 order that all admissions should be made strictly on the basis of NEET rankings. The bench, however, permitted all those who had participated in NEET-1 on May 1 to again write the NEET-2 exam in July and said they have to give up their May 1 test.

The bench in its order said, “Prima facie, we do not find any infirmity in the NEET regulation on the ground that it affects the rights of the states or the private institutions. Special provisions for reservation of any category are not subject matter of the NEET nor are the rights of minorities in any manner affected by NEET.

NEET only provides for conducting entrance test for eligibility for admission to the MBBS/BDS course. We thus do not find any merit in the applications seeking modification of order dated 28th April, 2016.

Only other contention relates to perceived hardship to the students who have either applied for NEET-I but could not appear, or who appeared but could not prepare fully thinking that the preparation was to be only for 15 per cent all-India seats and there will be further opportunity to appear in other examinations. To allay any such apprehension, we direct that all such eligible candidates who could not appear in NEET-I, and those who had appeared but have apprehension that they had not prepared well, be permitted to appear in NEET-2, subject to seeking an option from the said candidates to give up their candidature for NEET-1.”

The bench said, “It would be open to the respondents to reschedule the date of holding NEET-2, if necessary. To this extent the earlier orders stand modified. We may also add here that to ensure total credibility of the examination to be held by the CBSE, the oversight committee (headed by Justice Lodha) appointed by this court in the judgment dated 2nd May, 2016 shall also oversee the NEET-2 examination to be conducted by the CBSE. In view of the above, it is also clarified that only NEET would enable students to get admission to MBBS or BDS studies.”