EWS quota in NEET: SC to take it up on Wednesday

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, January 4

The Supreme Court is likely to take up on Wednesday the issue of the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) quota in NEET for admissions to PG medical courses after the Centre sought an urgent hearing in view of protests by doctors.

”I have to constitute a Special Bench. Let me see tomorrow,” Chief Justice of India NV Ramana told Solicitor General Tushar Mehta after the latter submitted that the issue of EWS quota in admissions to postgraduate medical courses needed to be taken up urgently as students were facing difficulties.

”If it is a three-judge Bench matter then it will be listed before a three-judge Bench tomorrow,” the CJI told Mehta who sought urgent listing of the case.

The Federation of Resident Doctors’ Association has been holding large scale protests in Delhi and other parts of the country over the delay in the NEET-PG counselling, which has been postponed due to the Centre deciding to revisit the criteria for the determination of the EWS quota.

On Monday, a bench led by Justice DY Chandrachud had told the Centre that a Bench of requisite strength could be set up by the CJI as the EWS quota matter was being heard by a three-judge Bench.

The top court is hearing petitions challenging 27 per cent reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBCs) and 10 per cent quota for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) introduced by the Centre this year in the All-India Quota (AIQ) seats in state medical institutions.

On October 25, the Centre had told the top court that counselling for PG medical courses will not start till the court decided the matter.

The court is examining the feasibility of having Rs 8 lakh as a cap to avail the EWS quota for PG medical admissions.

In an affidavit filed in the top court, the Centre said it has decided to accept the recommendation of a three-member panel to retain the current gross annual family income limit of Rs 8 lakh or less for defining EWS.

Set up November 30 last year, the panel headed by former Finance Secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey submitted its report on December 31. It concluded that family income was a “feasible criterion” for defining EWS and, in the current situation, a threshold of Rs 8 lakh of annual family income seemed reasonable.

The panel recommended that “only those families whose annual income is up to Rs 8 lakh would be eligible to get the benefit of EWS reservation”, it told the court. It said, “EWS may, however exclude, irrespective of income, a person whose family has five acres or more of agricultural land.”

The process to revisit the criteria delayed the NEET-PG 2021 counselling triggered protests by doctors in Delhi and elsewhere seeking expeditious removal of the legal impediments. The protesting doctors said due to a delay of eight months in counselling of the NEET-PG 2021 batch, there was an “acute shortage” of resident doctors across India.