LexDR. HARIHAR PRASAD SINGH AND ORS. versus PRINCIPAL, M.L.N. MEDICAL COLLEGE ALLAHABAD AND OTHERS.
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DR. HARIHAR PRASAD SINGH AND ORS. v. PRINCIPAL, M.L.N. MEDICAL COLLEGE ALLAHABAD AND OTHERS. AUGUST 21, 1990 [S. RANGANATHAN AND K.N. SAIKIA, JJ.] Professional Colleges-Admission to: Residency Scheme-Clause "- . 5-Motila/ Nehru Medical College-Admission to P. G. Course-'Us samav' interpretation. · The appellants are junior doctors who were in a house job on 22.8.1989. They had been admitted to post-graduate degree course (second year) in the M.L.N. Medical College under the "Residency Scheme" for junior doctors, which was notified on 22.8.1989 hut was given retrospective effect from 1.8.1987. They, however, lost their_ seats as A B c a result of the High Court's decision allowiiig the writ petitions filed by D the respondent-doctors whose applications for admission to the same course had been rejected. The modifications introduced by the Residency Scheme needed certain transitory provisions being made for two purposes. The fll'St was to devise a formula of equating between the old and the new E ./systems. This was done by redesignating all students, junior doctors, house officers and others in position in the manner set out in para 5 of the scheme. The second provision necessary was in regard to their admission to the post-graduate courses. This was done by the second sub-para of para 5. The respondent-doctors who had done their M.B.B.S., internship l and house-job by April 1988 and who had even obtained admission, in ~March 1989, into a diploma course, sought admission in the M.L.N. College into the second year of a degree course by taking advantage of clause 5 of the Residency Scheme. Their applications were rejected on the ground that the clause 5 of the scheme was a transitory provision intended to benefit only persons who were on a house job as on 22.8.1989; they alone could take advantage of the scheme as soon as they completed the house job; and not persons who had completed their house-job I much earlier to that date. Thereupon, these doctors filed writ petitions ~.in the High Court. A Division Bench of the High Court allowed the petitions and held that clause 5 extended the privilege of admission to 895 F G H A B c D 896 SUPREME COURT REPORTS [ 1990] 3 S.C.R. the second year of the degree conrse to all persons who were working as house-officers on or after 1st Angnst, 1987. -\ The State as well as certain doctors who were in house-jobs as on 22.8.1989 and who had been admitted to post graduate degree courses on the basis of the State's interpretation of the scheme but lost their seats as a resnlt of the High Court's decision, have preferred these appeals. So far as the present appeals are concerned, all parties have pro- _ _._, ceeded on the footing that the residency scheme is a valid one and that it envisaged that a person who had completed house-job for one year could get admission into the second year of the course (whether degree or diploma). The only controversy is whether this admission was open only to those persons who were in a house-job as on 22.8.1989 and had completed it before 30.10.1989. Dismissing the appeals, this Court, HELD: (1) There is no role which prohibits a person (even though he may already be a student in a post-graduate course) from seeking admission to the second year of junior residency, the eligibility clauses for admission to which he fulfills. The High Court was, therefore, right in holding that they could not he excluded from consideration for E admission to the second year of the degree course merely because they'.- were already students in a diploma course. [90IH; 902A-B] F G H - (2) To ask persons, who had already completed a one year house job, to undergo the three year degree/two year diploma course would be a severe handicap to them as, earlier, they could have got their post- _... graduate degree/diploma course after two years/one year. In order to adjust them into the new scheme the State designated holders of house jobs as "junior residents (first year)" under the new scheme. ThiS'lli enabled the holders of house-jobs to get into the second year course under the residency scheme. [902H; 903A] (3) The scheme, however, could not be stretched and converted into a limitless provision making it possible for all persons who had completed their house jobs at some distant past to compete for admis- sion to the second year of the degree course. That is why para 5 limited the scope of th
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