NRI student denied permission in Dr MGR Medical University

Tamil Nadu: An NRI student seeking admission for MBBS course in a private college in Coimbatore attached to Dr MGR Medical University has been denied permission by MCI. Following which a writ petition was filed by her in the Madras High Court. The court has stayed MCI’s decision. The case involves an NRI student who furnished a Singapore-Cambridge General Certificate of Education in December 2013 to MCI. However, the student had not studied biology (subject) from the Singapore based institute. Only later did the student pursue Physics, Chemistry, Biology and English examinations conducted by National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) in Noida in October 2014 and cleared the exam.

After being denied permission by MCI, a writ petition was filed by her seeking permission in the court for MBBS admission in a private college in Coimbatore. She sought the permit under NRI quota. In legal terms, the petition filed said that she is eligible to apply for the course under NRI quota when clause 4(2) of MCI Regulations, 1997, published in the gazette on November 3, 2010, requires applicants to have undertaken two years of regular and continuous study of physics, chemistry and biology.

Hindu highlighted the judgment in writing by Justice Venugopal which pointed out that the MCI Regulations also state that candidates whose course content was not as prescribed for ‘10 plus two’ school education structure would have to undergo one year of pre-professional training before admission to medical colleges.

'“In the present case, the appellant lacks such professional training too,” he added.

The petition filed by the student further implies that after applying to the private medical college in Coimbatore, she was asked by the college authorities to procure a certificate of eligibility from Dr. MGR Medical University. However, when she approached the university she was told that she cannot obtain the certificate as biology subject was not part of her curriculum in Singapore. This is the reason why she pursued biology paper in NIOS in 2014.

Still, the university officials did not issue the required certificate to her. Only this time, she was informed that she has to pass Physics, Chemistry, Biology and English together. She approached NIOS for all four subjects and cleared all four papers in October 2014.

The university later sought clarity from MCI on the case, asking whether she can secure admission to MBBS degree course in 2015-16. MCI denied permission on the grounds subject to NIOS examination cleared by her.

She filed a writ petition challenging the decision and a single judge dismissed it on February 18 leading to the present writ appeal, reported Hindu.