Courts cannot override eligibility criteria for admissions: Punjab and Haryana High Court

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has made it clear that courts cannot use discretionary powers to override clear eligibility requirements set by law. The bench ruled that a writ court’s equitable jurisdiction could also not be used to grant relief contradicting fundamental legal principles.

Equitable jurisdiction refers to the court’s authority to apply principles of equity or even-handedness, rather than strict legal rules, to cases. “Equity, in its true essence, does not entail bestowing that which the law does not contemplate, nor does it envisage the conferment of benefits that stand in stark contradiction to statutory mandates,” the bench ruled.

The assertion came as division bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sumeet Goel dismissed a petition seeking admission to a BAMS course, while ruling that the petitioner was ineligible under a clause of the admission notification as he had passed his qualifying examination from two different boards.

Taking up the petition filed by Gurpreet Singh against Guru Ravidas Ayurved University and another respondent, the bench asserted that equity followed the law and could not be invoked to nullify statutory conditions. “The law countenances no preferential treatment or relaxation in favour of an individual, particularly when such relaxation has neither statutory sanction nor any reasonable nexus with the avowed objective behind the eligibility criteria,” the court ruled.

The petitioner was seeking directions to the respondents to allot him a seat for BAMS in a private college after clearing the NEET-2024 examination. The admission was denied as he had passed Biology as an additional subject from Himachal Pradesh Board of School Education after completing his 10 2 from Punjab School Education Board. The court noted that the admission notification clause mandated that a candidate must pass the qualifying examination from a single board or university.

The bench also quoted a Supreme Court ruling: “Possession of requisite educational qualification is mandatory. The same should not be uncertain. If any uncertainty is allowed to prevail, the employer would be flooded with applications of ineligible candidates. A cut-off date for the purpose of determining the eligibility of the candidates concerned must, therefore, be fixed.”

The court ruled that this principle applied to the admission process as well. “Juxtaposing the clause and the qualifications possessed by the petitioner leads to the irresistible conclusion that the petitioner is not qualified to apply for the course in question… Ergo, the petitioner cannot be stated to be qualified for securing admission to the course in question as he does not possess the mandatory educational requirements/qualifications for the same,” the judgment read.

The bench further elaborated on the limits of equitable jurisdiction.

“The invocation of equitable jurisdiction does not confer upon the court an unfettered prerogative to render orders in complete defiance or in oblivion of the established tenets of the law of the land.”