Supreme Court To Hear Plea Seeking Postponement Of NEET-PG 2022 Exam On May 13

The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a petition preferred by doctors seeking to postpone the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test for Postgraduate (NEET-PG) 2022 exam scheduled on May 21 citing clash with ongoing counselling for NEET PG 2021 on May 13, 2022 ie Friday.The petition filed by Dr R Dinesh Kumar Reddy and few other doctors was mentioned by Senior Advocate Rakesh Khanna before the bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and PS Narasimha."Do you want the postponement?" the bench asked when the Senior Counsel mentioned."Yes, a little bit" replied the Senior Counsel.Agreeing to hear the plea, the bench said, "How can we postpone the national exam? We will list it for hearing first."The petition was filed through Advocate Ashutosh Dubey and Abhishekh Chauhan.It was argued in the petition that NEET-PG 2022 aspirants/ candidates should not be made to suffer and be given a fair opportunity of participation in the NET PG Examination 2022 when the counseling of last year NEET PG 2021 is still undergoing and likely to be over by 9.5.2022, if not extended or faulted with, for no fault of theirs."Some of the petitioners and aspirants are the candidates who have appeared in NET PG 2021 and are participants in ongoing counselling process which is unlikely to get concluded by 9.5.2022 considering the roller-coster ride which they have been subjected to since July 2021. The petitioners and other thousands of aspirants are becoming victim of the system and are made to suffer for no fault of their own," the plea states.Doctors in the petition had further stated that the doctors cannot be deprived of even filling up of forms for NEET PG Examination 2022, as the last date for it was closed on 25.3.2022 and the petitioners being participants in AIQ Mop-up counselling did not fill form then in hope of getting seat and now after cancellation of AIQ Mop-up on 31.3.2022."Because of fault of the respondents, the petitioners are now not even allowed to fill forms for NEET PG Examination and thus the candidates neither got seat in 2021 Examination counselling nor could register for NET PG 2022 Examination and would be wasting a full year without their fault," petition further stated.Along with seeking to quash the notification dated February 4, 2022 issued by NBE for holding NEET PG 2022, doctors in the plea have further sought for notification of a fresh date after 8 weeks so that the issue of NEET PG 2021 counselling exam gets settled.Relief has further been sought to permit the students to register themselves for NEET PG 2022 as they were participating in counselling for NEET PG 2021 and that the last date of form was March 25, 2022. It may also be noted that the All India Medical Students Association has also filed a writ petition seeking postponement of NEET-PG 22.Last month, the Supreme Court had dismissed a plea to extend the internship deadline of July 31 for NEET-PG 2022 saying that it will disrupt the academic schedule. Many students sought for extension of the internship deadline saying that they could not perform internship as they were called to engage in the COVID-19 duties. The original deadline of March 31 was extended to July 31 by the Centre following an earlier direction by the Court to consider the representation of students. NEET-PG 2021 was postponed many times due to the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic. The 2021 PG exam, originally scheduled to be held in April 2021, was held only on September 11, 2021. The NEET-PG counselling got delayed due to a case pending in the Supreme Court challenging the implementation of EWS-OBC reservation in the All India Quota. It was in the first week of January 2022 that the Supreme Court allowed the counselling process to start based on the existing criteria for EWS-OBC reservation in AIQ. There were several cases filed against the counselling process as well. On March 31, the Court cancelled the mop-up round counselling in view of anomalies in the addition of 146 additional seats and directed the holding of a special round for the newly added seats. Some petitions are pending in the High Courts as well, challenging the counselling process for State Quota. In 2020, the Supreme Court had dismissed a plea to postpone NEET exam on the ground of COVID-19.Case Title: Dr R Dinesh Kumar Reddy v. Medical Counselling Committee| WP(C) 341 of 2022Click Here To Read/Download Order

Supreme Court To Hear Plea Seeking Postponement Of NEET-PG 2022 Exam On May 13

Shruti Kakkar

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