CJI B.R. Gavai, Justice K. Vinod Chandran, Supreme Court
Rule Defining Local Candidate Perfectly In Order: Supreme Court Upholds Telangana’s 4-Yr-Domicile Rule For MBBS & BDS Admissions
|The Supreme Court held that the pre-amended rule defining a local candidate was perfectly in order, and there was no warrant for a reading down when the definition was clear.
The Supreme Court has upheld the Telangana Medical & Dental Colleges Admission (Admission into MBBS & BDS Courses) Rules, 2017, and its amendment made in the year 2024. The Apex Court affirmed the rule defining a local candidate and mandating that a candidate who has studied in an educational institution in a local area for not less than four consecutive academic years would be entitled to seek admission as a local candidate for admission to the course of study for MBBS and BDS.
The Apex Court held that the pre-amended rule defining a local candidate was perfectly in order, and there was no warrant for a reading down when the definition was clear.
The Division Bench of Chief Justice of India B. R. Gavai and Justice K. Vinod Chandran held, “We have already held that the pre-amended rule defining a local candidate was perfectly in order, which reasoning applies squarely to the amended rule also. There was no warrant for a reading down when the definition is clear, in consonance with the Presidential Order and similar rules having been upheld by this Court as coming out from the binding precedents. We find no reason to take a different view with respect to the amended rule also; 15% having been conceded to the AllIndia quota.”
AOR Abhijit Sengupta represented the Appellant while AOR Mukesh Kumar Mishra represented the Respondent.
Factual Background
Article 371D as it stood before the division, referred to special provisions with respect to the State of Andhra Pradesh for providing equitable opportunities and facilities to the people belonging to the State, both in the matters of public employment and education. After division, the nominal heading was substituted to include State of Telangana, which enabled the President, by order to provide, having regard to the requirements of each State, for equitable opportunities and facilities for the people belonging to different parts of such States, in the matter of public employment and in the matter of education, in exercise of the powers conferred thereby.
The Andhra Pradesh Educational Institutions (Regulations of Admissions) Order, 1974 divided the State into three local areas of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Rayalaseema as applicable to the Osmania University, Andhra Pradesh University and Sri Venkateswara University, respectively. The Andhra Pradesh Educational Institutions (Regulation of Admissions) Second Amendment Order, 1976, amplified the said definition to take in students who had, during the preceding years of qualification, studied in different local areas.
Two separate Rules containing almost similar definitions were under challenge before the High Court. The first batch of Writ Petitions challenged the Telangana Medical & Dental Colleges Admission (Admission into MBBS & BDS Courses) Rules, 2017. Closely following suit, the second batch of Writ Petitions challenging the amendments brought into the definition of ‘local candidates’ vide GOMS No.33 dated July 19, 2024 was also allowed. The High Court had expanded the definition to include any student who produced his residence certificate issued by a competent authority of the Government of Telangana. Both these judgments were challenged before the Apex Court.
Arguments
The State of Telangana alleged that the expansion of the definition, on the subjective satisfaction of the High Court, would lead to frustrating the special provision under Article 371D, intended to confer a benefit to those local candidates in the State of Telangana who can be given preferential admission to the medical courses.
The respondents, students, urged that the definition of a local candidate itself is gross and does not reckon the vagaries of life and employment of the parents, which takes the children away from the State, whose roots remain all the same within the State.
Reasoning
The Bench noted that the State was prompted to amend the rule by G.O (MS) No.33 dated July 19, 2024, incorporating a fresh Rule 3 in the Rules of 2017. The said amendment provided for the ‘Competent Authority Quota’ in the State of Telangana. The new rule provided for the reservation to an extent of 85% to those candidates who have either (i) studied in the educational institutions in the local area for a period of not less than four consecutive academic years ending with the academic year in which he qualified for admission or (ii) where during the whole or any part of the four consecutive years ending with the academic year in which he qualified for admission, resided in the local area but without studying in any educational institutions, which candidate also should have appeared for the qualifying examination in the State of Telangana.
Reference was made to the amendment incorporating a proviso to Rule 3. This provides that a candidate who studies outside Telangana for any period during the requisite four consecutive academic years ending with the academic year in which he appeared, or as the case may be, first appeared in the relevant qualifying examination, will be eligible to be considered if they fall under the mentioned categories. These include children of employees of the Telangana State Government who have served or are serving outside Telangana; children of serving or retired employees belonging to the Telangana cadre of IAS/IFS/IPS; children of defence personnel/ex-servicemen/ Central Armed Police Force service who have declared their hometown to be in the State of Telangana and children of employees of a Corporation/Agency/ Instrumentality under Government of Telangana, liable to be transferred anywhere in India.
The Bench was of the view that the said proviso should allay and mitigate the grievances of those who claim that they were taken out of the State by compulsion of the movement of their parents outside the State by reason of employment in Government/All-India Services/ Corporations or Public Sector Undertakings constituted as an instrumentality of the State of Telangana as also defence and paramilitary forces who trace their nativity to the State, subject to the conditions thereunder. “With only the said reservation, we uphold the Rules of 2017 as it stood amended in 2024. We were told that in the previous academic year on concession made by the Government before this Court, students who did not fall strictly under the definition were granted admission to mitigate the grievance of the hardship alleged and argued. We make it clear that the admissions so made shall not be disturbed.”
Allowing the appeals of the State and the University and setting aside both the impugned judgments in the Writ Petitions filed by the students, the Bench held, “The Writ Petitions filed by the students before this Court, as a consequence stand dismissed; however, with the reservation insofar as candidates who are covered by the proviso to Rule 3 as specified in paragraph 34 above.”
Cause Title: The State of Telangana v. Kalluri Naga Narasimha Abhiram (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 1058)
Appearance
Appellant: AOR Abhijit Sengupta, AOR Sravan Kumar Karanam
Respondent: AOR Mukesh Kumar Mishra, AOR Vipin Nair, AOR Krishna Dev Jagarlamudi, AOR Guntur Pramod Kumar, AOR Neelam Sharma, AOR Vairawan A.S, AOR Ishaan George, AOR B. Shravanth Shanker, AOR Arvind Gupta, AOR Abhijit Sengupta, AOR Bhabna Das, AOR Sriram P., AOR Irshad Ahmad, AOR Mukesh Kumar Mishra, AOR Kumar Dushyant Singh, AOR Miss Akansha, AOR Anurag, AOR Ritu Reniwal, AOR Mahfooz Ahsan Nazki, AOR Guntur Pramod Kumar