The Delhi High Court dismissed a petition filed by the Chintpurni Medical College and Hospital challenging the then Medical Council of India’s rejection of the college’s request to admit students in the MBBS course for 2019-20.
A single-judge bench of Justice Jayant Nath observed that the petitioners have on completion of the debarment of two years taken no steps to seek inspection of the existing facilities to demonstrate that there are no infirmities or inadequacies in the infrastructure. Even in this writ petition, there is no relief sought to re-inspect the college of the petitioners to verify the availability of the relevant infrastructure. The only prayer in the writ petition is to set aside the impugned communication.
“Thereby, in the absence of an inspection and verification of the available infrastructure of the petitioner college, in the facts and circumstances of the case, it is not possible to direct the respondents to permit the petitioners to admit students for the year 2020-21, the relief for the year 2019-20 being infructuous,” the court said while dismissing the plea.
The petitioner said it owns a hospital to which a College is also attached. The clinical facilities of the hospital are available to the College for the purpose of teaching. The State of Punjab issued an Essentiality Certificate on 07.12.2010 in favour of the petitioner College keeping into account the available infrastructure facilities, equipment, faculty strength, etc.
The petitioner added that they have got the permission to take in 150 students and thereafter an assessment was carried out to verify the deficiencies in the previous assessment report. The Executive committee of the Medical Council of India recommended for debarment of the College from admitting students for the academic years 2017-18 and 2018-19 to encash the bank guarantee of Rs 2 crore.
By an earlier order of Punjab and Haryana High Court in a writ petition filed by the students studying in batch 2013-14 of Chintpurni Medical College seeking direction to shift the students to some other recognised medical college in the State of Punjab, the court ordered the government to shift the students to other efficient medical colleges in the state.
The Counsel for the Petitioner College submitted that the Supreme Court dismissed a past SLP and held that the petitioner college could apply for recognition after 2 years for the batch of 2019-20 and 2020-21 as it was debarred by the board to admit students for the batch 2017-18 and 2018-19.
The Counsel for Respondent argued that the petitioner college has concealed material facts that no students are being taught and trained in the Medical College as all the batches of students admitted during the academic years 2011-12, 2014-15 and 2016-17 have already been shifted to other medical colleges by the State Government and that the petitioner Medical College is not functional.
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While placing reliance on past Punjab and Haryana High Court and Supreme Court’s observations, it was stated that the conditional recognition granted to the petitioner college by the Medical Council of India’s notification that the petitioners have failed to comply with the conditions imposed thereunder. It is further stated that even otherwise, the petitioner College is completely defunct and without students, teachers and other facilities. No students are studying in the petitioner due to gross performance discrepancies like infrastructural and clinical facilities. The petitioners have to also apply afresh under Section 10A of the IMC Act, which they failed to do so before a prior assessment of past dysfunctions.