Neil Aurelio Nunes and Ors. vs Union of India and Ors.
Background
On 29 July 2021 the Union Health Ministry notified 27% reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBC, non-creamy layer) and 10% reservation for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) in the All-India Quota (AIQ) seats of NEET-UG and NEET-PG medical/dental admissions for 2021-22. A group of medical aspirants and doctors challenged this notification, arguing that OBC reservation in AIQ seats was impermissible and that the Rs 8 lakh income criterion used to define EWS was arbitrary. The Court had earlier (7 January 2022) passed a short order upholding OBC reservation and allowing counselling to proceed, with detailed reasons to follow: this document contains those detailed reasons, delivered as two connected documents dated 20 January 2022: a full "Judgment" on the OBC reservation question, and a separate "Order" giving reasons for permitting EWS reservation to continue for the current admission cycle while the validity of the EWS income criteria itself was deferred to a later hearing.
Decision Breakdown
On OBC reservation, the Court held it constitutionally valid, reasoning that merit in a competitive exam is not a neutral or purely individual measure: high marks reflect social, economic and cultural advantages as much as ability, so reservation actually furthers, rather than conflicts with, a substantive (as opposed to purely formal) conception of equality under Article 15(1), (4) and (5). It held that AIQ seats, being seats "surrendered" by the states to the Centre, fall within the Union Government's policy-making power to reserve, and that the 29 July 2021 notice, issued before the exam was held and before the counselling-stage seat matrix was disclosed to candidates, did not unlawfully change the "rules of the game" mid-process. On the EWS question, the Court declined to stay the Rs 8 lakh income-based EWS criteria at the interim stage, holding that a constitutional challenge should not be pre-empted by an interim order absent prima facie arbitrariness, and that further delay (given the pandemic and the already-advanced admission timeline) would harm doctor recruitment; it therefore allowed the 2021-22 counselling to proceed under the existing EWS criteria while listing the deeper challenge to that criteria for final hearing in March 2022.
Lesson Learnt
Reservation for OBCs in Central government-controlled seats like the AIQ medical quota is constitutionally valid, and courts will not treat competitive-exam scores alone as a complete or neutral measure of "merit." Separately, when a policy is challenged as arbitrary, courts are reluctant to grant interim relief that disrupts an ongoing public process (like an admission cycle already underway) unless the arbitrariness is clearly apparent on the face of it: full scrutiny of the EWS income criteria was reserved for a later, dedicated hearing rather than decided at this interim stage.