Karnataka High Court quashes govt notification reducing seats to 15% for in-service quota in PG medical courses

Court says that no cogent reason was cited to reduce seats from 30%; asks govt to take decision afresh based on relevant criteria

The High Court of Karnataka has quashed the notification issued by the State government in reducing the number of seats to 15% from 30% of the total government quota seats for in-service candidates in the post-graduate medical courses for the year 2022-23.

However, the Court gave liberty to the Government to prescribe afresh the quota of seats for in-service candidates while taking into account relevant criteria and to fill up the seats.

The Court also quashed the seat-matrix issued by the Government on October 9 for admission to various PG medical courses.

Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice S. Vishwajith Shetty passed the order on October 21 while allowing the petitions filed by Swathi K.S and others, who are serving as doctors in various primary health centres across the State under Department of Health and Family Welfare.

With this order, the process of counselling for the admission to PG courses will have to begin anew after the Government takes a decision on in-service quota and comes out with a fresh seat matrix.

The petitioners had questioned the legality of the October 6 notification issued by the government to reduce the number of seats to 15%. They had contended that 392 seats were available to be chosen by 86 eligible candidates last year as 30% of the total government quota seats were earmarked for service when compared to the availability of only 206 seats for the 113 eligible candidates this year.

Meanwhile, the Government has contended that decision to reduce the quota of seats for in-service candidates to 15% was taken after noticing that number of seats, earmarked at 30%, was much more than the number of in-service candidates eligible for admission this year.