SC certificate signed by UT executive magistrate must

Saurabh Malik

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 7

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has ruled that a candidate for the MBBS/BDS/BHMS course was required to submit a Scheduled Caste certificate signed by UT Executive Magistrate for taking benefit of the UT, Chandigarh, pool.

The ruling by the Bench of Justice Daya Chaudhary and Justice Sudhir Mittal came on a bunch of three petitions filed by Akshay Kumar and other petitioners against the Union of India, the Union Territory of Chandigarh and other respondents.

The issue for consideration by the High Court was whether the students were required to submit a Scheduled Caste certificate signed by UT Executive Magistrate for taking benefit of the Chandigarh pool or of the state to which they belonged.

Culling facts from one of the petitions, the Bench observed the petitioner was seeking directions for setting aside a condition laid down in a clause in the centralised admission prospectus for the MBBS/BDS/BHMS course for the 2019 session.

The clause made it clear that candidates belonging to the Scheduled Caste category were required to submit a certificate issued by a first-class tehsildar or magistrate or the UT Deputy Commissioner. It was added that candidates with certificates issued by states other than the UT would not be considered eligible against the seats reserved for Scheduled Caste candidates in the Chandigarh pool. The candidates not submitting the certificates would be considered in the general category of the UT pool.

Appearing before the Bench, UT senior standing counsel Pankaj Jain, along with Ashish Rawal and Anil Mehta for other respondents, submitted that the issue in the present petition had already been settled by the judgment of the Supreme Court’s Constitution Bench.

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