Supreme Court junks petition against National Medical Commission's decision not to hold NEET-SS Exam 2024

Satya Prakash

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New Delhi, August 14

The Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a petition challenging the National Medical Commission’s decision not to hold the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test-Super Speciality (NEET-SS) 2024, terming it as “fairly equitable”.

NEET-SS Exam is meant for doctors having post-graduate degrees like MD, MS, and DNB, or an equivalent qualification seeking admission to super-speciality courses.

A Bench led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud – which refused to tinker with the examination calendar, however, asked the NMC to announce NEET-SS Exam Schedule in 30 days for holding it in January 2025.

The Supreme Court had on July 19 asked the Centre, Medical Counselling Committee and the NMC to respond to a petition challenging the NMC’s decision not to conduct NEET-Super Speciality examination in 2024.

Citing an earlier judgement, the petitioners --  13 doctors including Rahul Balwan – had contended that NEET-SS had to be held every year and the time schedule had already been fixed by the top court for admission to super-speciality courses.

However, senior advocate Gaurav Sharma pointed out on behalf of the NMC that if NEET-SS was held this year, the students of 2021 PG batch would lose the chance as they would be completing their courses only in January 2025.

Taking note of Sharma’s submissions, the Bench said the NMC’s decision was “fairly equitable” and can’t be termed as “arbitrary” as NMC data suggested that at least 40 per cent of the students appearing for NEET-SS exam were from the immediately preceding batch.