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Dr. Rachit Sinha & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors.

Miscellaneous Application · 2018 INSC 499Decided 11 May 2018
Miscellaneous Application No. 1344 of 2018 in Writ Petition (Civil) No. 357 of 2018
Justice S.A. Bobde · Justice L. Nageswara Rao

Background

This miscellaneous application arose within an ongoing batch of writ petitions (W.P. (C) Nos. 357/2018, 361/2018, 366/2018 and 424/2018) concerning the counselling process for medical seat admissions under the All India Quota. By an earlier order dated 03.05.2018, the Court had directed that unfilled seats after the second round of All India Quota counselling be reverted to the States for a further round, but had mistakenly also directed deemed/Central institutions to conduct a second round even though no seats were being reverted to them. The applicants (M.A. No. 1344/2018) sought directions in relation to this counselling schedule.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court first corrected its own earlier order, clarifying that the words "and deemed/Central Institutions" in paragraph 9 of the 03.05.2018 order stood deleted, since the direction to conduct a second round of counselling was meant to apply only to the States, not to deemed/Central institutions, as no seats were being reverted to the latter. Having clarified this, the Court dismissed the applications for directions filed in M.A. No. 1344 of 2018. In a connected application (M.A. No. 1345/2018) filed by the State of Madhya Pradesh seeking more time to complete counselling (citing 415 unfilled seats), the Court extended the deadline for the State's second round of counselling to 15.05.2018 and the mop-up round to 19.05.2018.

Lesson Learnt

Courts overseeing time-bound administrative processes like medical admission counselling will readily correct clerical errors in their own earlier orders, and may grant reasonable, narrowly-tailored extensions of time to government bodies facing genuine implementation difficulties, while still dismissing applications that do not independently warrant separate directions.

Official source (sci.gov.in)View Judgment (PDF)

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