A physically challenged student’s medical seat was cancelled by Belgaum Institute of Medical Sciences for sending her disability certificate a few seconds post the deadline.
The Karnataka High Court come to the rescue of a physically challenged student, Tazeen Inamdar, whose medical seat for undergraduate MBBS course has been cancelled by Belgaum Institute of Medical Sciences for sending her fresh disability certificate delayed by few seconds before 5 pm deadline, despite sending through Whatsapp intime.
“At times, life plays trick with persons and they become victims of circumstances, as has happened with the petitioner, a brilliant girl belonging to minority community. No prejudice would be caused to anyone if she is allotted the seat in question”, observed a division bench of Justice Krishna S Dixit and Justice P Krishna Bhat, while directing the institute to accommodate her.
After admission formalities, she started attending the academic session with effect from March 28, 2022. On the same day, the Nodal Officer of the institution informed cancellation of her admission, disregarding her request for reconsideration of candidature inasmuch as the UG counselling-2021 was extending by the Medical Counseling Committee till 5 pm on March 31, 2022.
She procured the certificate of disability from designated Goa Medical College on March 31, 2022 at around 5 pm and sent the soft copy of the same both through Whatsapp and email. However, by the time these messages were looked into by the Nodal Officer, the cut-off time 5 pm was already over and the medical seat in question was allotted to some other student. Therefore, she knocked the doors of the high court.
After hearing the arguments, the court said that no prejudice would be caused to anyone if she is allotted the seat in question since other students has already procured admission elsewhere. Otherwise, the vacant seat would go waste and that is not in the interest of anyone. Justice of the case warrants, the poor petitioner being accommodated in the vacancy so that she would emerge as a good Doctor to serve the society at large, in due course. It is significant to note that petitioner, admittedly, has been attending the classes in the institute from the day one till now and therefore, there is no reason to deny the seat in question on the ground of loss of attendance or the like, the court added.
