Can states provide reservation for in-service candidates in PG Medical Courses? Constitution Bench of Supreme Court reserves verdict

A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court today reserved its judgment in a batch of petitions related to the issue of whether states can provide reservation for in-service candidates in postgraduate medical courses (Tamil Nadu Medical Officers Association and ors. v. Union of India)..The Constitution Bench of Justices Arun Mishra, Indira Banerjee, Vineet Saran, MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose held the first hearing via video conferencing and reserved the verdict after hearing parties at length for the entire day. .The petitioners had challenged Regulations 9(4) and (8) of the Post Graduate Medical Education Regulations, 2000, as framed by the Medical Council of India. .The primary argument of the petitioner was that the coordination and determination of standards in institutions for higher education is within the exclusive domain of the Union. Medical education being under Entry 25 of List III, though made subject to Entry 66 of List I, is a subject under the Concurrent List and thus, states were not denuded of their power to legislate on the manner and method for admissions to postgraduate medical courses..When the case was previously before the three-judge Bench of Justices Kurian Joseph, Mohan M Shantanagoudar and Navin Sinha, the Centre had relied upon Dinesh Singh Chauhan case, in which it was held that the state cannot provide reservation to in-service candidates to PG Courses..The three-judge Bench headed by Justice Joseph had agreed with the petitioners' argument that in Dinesh Chauhan, the Court had not consider edthe legislative Entries and there was no reference to three Constitution Bench decisions of the Apex Court, namely, R Chitralekha and Another v. State of Mysore and Others, Chitra Ghosh and Another v. Union of India, and Modern Dental College and Research Centre and Others v. State of Madhya Pradesh and Others..Senior Advocate Arvind Datar, appearing for the petitioners in the case, argued that the Apex Court had earlier held that Dinesh Singh Chauhan was in line with the Modern Dental College verdict. However, Justice Mishra pointed out that the Modern Dental College verdict had a different subject relating to centralised university admissions. .Regardless, Datar insisted that Dinesh Singh Chauhan had to be overruled..Senior Advocate Vikas Singh, representing the Medical Council of India (MCI), argued that reservation was provided only to PG Diploma holders and not the postgraduate degree holders. MCI maintained that whether reservation can be given for PG degree or not would be determined by the states. .When Justice Mishra questioned why no reservation was granted in PG degree courses, Senior Advocate Singh stated,"In degree, there is no requirement to serve two years in a remote area and it binding is only for Diploma. Degree is for 3 years and Diploma 2 years.".In April 2018, a five-judge Bench of the Supreme Court, comprising then Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra and Justices AM Khanwilkar, DY Chandrachud, AK Sikri and Ashok Bhushan had rejected a petition filed by the Tamil Nadu Medical Officers Association demanding 50% reservation for in-service candidates in state quota seats. The Bench had also directed the Tamil Nadu government to only conduct the NEET PG counselling process as per the current amended regulations specified by the MCI..As per the petitioners, instead of granting incentive marks to government doctors serving in remote and difficult rural areas in PG admissions, the state government should be allowed to continue with its own quota policy and have the authority to make reservation in favour of in-service candidates for admission to PG medical courses.