The Chhattisgarh High Court has held that once the Indian Nursing Council (INC) relaxes the requirement of minimum qualifying percentile for admission to the B.Sc. (Nursing) course, the State Government cannot prescribe a fresh qualifying benchmark through an executive decision. The Court held that the State authorities could not insist upon a minimum 10th percentile after the INC had permitted admissions by relaxing the qualifying percentile for filling vacant seats. [2026 LiveLaw (Chh) 68]

Justice Amitendra Kishore Prasad was hearing two writ petitions filed by the Private Nursing College Association of Chhattisgarh and students seeking admission to the B.Sc. (Nursing) course for the Academic Session 2025-2026. After the initial rounds of counselling, the INC permitted a further round of counselling by relaxing the requirement of minimum qualifying percentile to fill the vacant seats. However, on the same day, the Commissioner, Medical Education, prescribed 10th percentile as the minimum qualifying benchmark for the fresh counselling.

The petitioners challenged this decision, contending that once the INC had relaxed the qualifying percentile, the State authorities had no authority to prescribe another qualifying benchmark. The student petitioners also contended that the uniform 10th percentile criterion ignored the relaxation available to reserved category candidates under the applicable Rules.

The Court noted that Rule 4(4) of the Chhattisgarh Nursing Admission Rules, 2019 requires admissions to be governed by the minimum qualifying standards prescribed by the Indian Nursing Council or the State Nursing Council and does not confer any independent authority upon the State to alter or substitute those standards. It held that once the INC exercised its statutory power under the Indian Nursing Council Act, 1947 and relaxed the qualifying percentile, the State was required only to implement that decision and could not introduce a fresh qualifying criterion of 10th percentile.

“… whenever the Indian Nursing Council prescribes, modifies or relaxes the qualifying standards, the respondent-State is under a statutory obligation to faithfully implement such directions. It cannot selectively adopt one part of the direction and simultaneously substitute another part by introducing a condition of its own,” the Court observed.

The Court further noted that the communication issued by the INC did not authorize the State to prescribe any such benchmark. It also found that prescribing a common 10th percentile for all categories disregarded the different qualifying standards originally prescribed by the INC for General, General-PWD and SC/ST/OBC candidates.

The Court highlighted that even after introducing the 10th percentile criterion, more than 2,000 seats continued to remain vacant, defeating the very purpose for which the relaxation had been sought.

Accordingly, the Court allowed both writ petitions and quashed the communication prescribing the 10th percentile as the minimum qualifying criterion for admission to the B.Sc. (Nursing) course for the Academic Session 2025-2026.

Case Title: Private Nursing College Association of Chhattisgarh v. State of Chhattisgarh & Ors. [WPC No. 215 of 2026]

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2026 LiveLaw (Chh) 68