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Glocal Medical College and Super Speciality Hospital and Research Centre v. Union of India

Writ Petition (Civil) · 2017 INSC 692Decided 1 Aug 2017
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 411 of 2017
Justice Dipak Misra · Justice Amitava Roy · Justice A.M. Khanwilkar

Background

A batch of medical colleges, led by Glocal Medical College, had been granted conditional permission by the Central Government in 2016 to admit MBBS students, based on the recommendation of the Supreme Court-mandated Oversight Committee (set up in the Modern Dental College case) despite deficiencies found by the Medical Council of India (MCI). After a further 2016 inspection found persisting deficiencies, the MCI recommended debarring these colleges from admissions for 2017-18 and 2018-19 and encashing their bank guarantees. Although the Oversight Committee later reviewed the matter and recommended confirming the colleges' permission (overriding the MCI's objections), the Central Government's order dated 31.05.2017 debarred the colleges anyway, without reference to the Oversight Committee's favourable recommendation or the full hearing record.

Decision Breakdown

The Court held that the Central Government's order could not be sustained because it was issued without providing the "reasonable opportunity of being heard" mandated by the proviso to Section 10A(4) of the Indian Medical Council Act, and because it ignored the divergent views of the MCI, the Hearing Committee, the Director General of Health Services, and crucially the Oversight Committee's own recommendation (which the Central Government had only forwarded to itself in a truncated, incomplete form). Since the Oversight Committee's recommendations, coming from a body constituted by the Supreme Court itself to oversee the MCI, could not simply be disregarded, the Court quashed the 31.05.2017 debarment order and directed the Central Government to reconsider the matter afresh, re-evaluating all the recommendations on record and affording the colleges a fresh hearing, with a final reasoned decision to be issued within 10 days.

Lesson Learnt

A government decision that imposes serious consequences (like debarring a college from student admissions) must be based on a fair, complete hearing and must actually engage with all relevant recommendations before it: selectively relying on only some inputs while ignoring a binding Court-appointed oversight body's favourable view can get the decision struck down for want of natural justice, even without the court itself deciding the underlying merits.

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

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