In a big relief to students seeking admission to medical and dental under-graduate and post graduate courses under Maratha reservation quota, the Maharashtra government on Monday promulgated the Maharashtra State Reservation for Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) (Amendment and Validation) Ordinance, 2019 to facilitate reservations to the students concerned.
Maharashtra Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao signed the ordinance on the basis of an advice given by the Maharashtra Cabinet that such an ordinance was necessary to provide the benefit of reservations in admissions to SEBC classes in Medical and Dental under-graduate and post-graduate courses.
“There shall now be reservations in favour of the candidates belonging to SEBC classes from the educational year 2019-20 and also for admissions to other educational courses including under-graduate courses requiring the passing of the NEET or any other National Entrance Test,” a statement issued by Raj Bhavan said in the evening.
The ordinance has been necessitated by the stay granted by the Bombay High Court on the 16 per cent quota offered to the Maratha community under the socially and educationally backward classes (SEBC) category for admission in this year's postgraduate medical courses.
The Nagpur bench of the high court had on May 2, said that the notification dated March 8 on the implementation of the new 16 per cent reservations for the Maratha community under the SEBC quota, would not be applicable to the post-graduate medical admission process which had begun earlier.
The high court agreed with the petitioners Shivani Raghuwanshi and Pranjali Charde who stated that the reservation was “unconstitutional” for this year’s admissions. Their argument was that the SEBC Act came into force on November 30, 2018, while the admission process for the PG medical courses had started prior to that, on October 16, 2018.
Following the high court’s order, Maharashtra government on March 4 filed a special leave petition (SLP) in the Supreme Court, challenging the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court's decision to stay the 16 per cent quota offered to the Maratha community under the socially and educationally backward classes (SEBC) category for admission in this year's postgraduate medical courses.
Immediately after the high court’s order, the students seeking admissions to post-graduate medical courses in the state had gone on an indefinite agitation seeking admissions under the Maratha reservations quota.
The Maharashtra government’s latest move comes as a huge relief to the agitating students seeking admissions to post-graduate medical courses under the Maratha reservation category.
It may be recalled that the PG medical courses had started on May 2, but on May 5, the students were informed that their admissions were cancelled, though they had paid full fees and joined duties.
They had secured admissions on the basis of the Maratha quota (SEBC) while cancelling their seats got through the All India Quota, but the SEBC quota has been declared invalid for the current year, he added.
The State government had last week assured the affected students that it would promulgates an ordinance to ensure the admission process was not affected in the Maratha reservations category.
Meanwhile, in its SLP filed before the apex court, the state government has submitted to the court that two rounds of the admission process has already been held and preparing a revised list now, will be unjust. The government also brought to the court's notice that the SEBC students, who cracked the two rounds of the admission process, have not made any representation before the High Court.
The state government has argued that deciding on the writ petition without involving the 'to be affected' parties results in violation of the principle of natural justice.
On its part, the State government had written a letter to the DMER on March 8, 2019 to incorporate and implement the SEBC quota from the academic year 2019 in their postgraduate medical courses.
However, the High Court, in its ruling, said that the government's notification of March 8, 2019 regarding the SEBC quota in health science courses will not be applicable for postgraduate admissions in dentistry and medicine since the registration process for NEET began on October 16 and November 2 in 2018, respectively.
