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State of Maharashtra and Others v. Dr. Sharvil Thatte and Others

Civil Appeal · 2018 INSC 309Decided 5 Apr 2018
Civil Appeal No. 3612 of 2018
Justice Arun Mishra · Justice Uday Umesh Lalit

Background

The State of Maharashtra's 2018 notification for admission to postgraduate medical/dental courses in unaided private colleges required candidates to be domiciled in Maharashtra. Several doctors challenged this condition before the Bombay High Court, which struck it down relying on earlier Supreme Court rulings against domicile-based restrictions in postgraduate medical admissions. The State appealed to the Supreme Court against that ruling.

Decision Breakdown

The Supreme Court noted that it had, the previous day, decided an essentially identical issue in Dr. Kriti Lakhina v. State of Karnataka, striking down a similar domicile/origin requirement for Karnataka's postgraduate medical admissions by relying on Dr. Pradeep Jain v. Union of India and Vishal Goyal v. State of Karnataka. Applying the same reasoning, the Court affirmed the Bombay High Court's view that while institutional preference in admissions can be permissible, an additional requirement that a candidate also be domiciled in the state is not. The appeal was accordingly dismissed with no order as to costs, upholding the quashing of the domicile condition.

Lesson Learnt

A state cannot impose a straightforward "domicile" requirement as a precondition for postgraduate medical admission even in private colleges: this principle applies uniformly across states, as shown by the Court applying its Karnataka ruling from the day before to an identical Maharashtra condition.

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

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