NEET row: TN MP files caveat in SC pre-empting CBSE’s appeal against Madras HC order

Despite the HC order on Tuesday, the Medical Council of India has decided to carry on with the counselling for medical college admissions in Tamil Nadu.

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CPI (M) Member of Parliament (MP) TK Rangarajan filed a caveat in the Supreme Court on Wednesday anticipating Central Board of Secondary Education’s appeal, seeking a stay on the Madras High Court ruling on NEET.

The Madurai bench of Madras HC had, on Tuesday, ordered the CBSE to give 196 grace marks to the students who had taken the NEET in Tamil.

“The caveat is intended to ensure that no stay is granted on the high court order without hearing me,” Rangarajan told the Times of India.

He also added that he wants the government to create more seats in government and private medical colleges and that if the affected students get admissions in private colleges, the extra fees over and above the amount payable in government medical colleges be borne by the government.

But despite the order from the Madras HC, the Medical Council of India (MCI) has decided to continue counselling saying that the order has not been issued to it directly.

“Neither MCI nor the ministry has received direct orders from the Court in this regard so we have decided to keep the process of counselling on,” said a senior health ministry official in the medical education division as per reports.

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijaya Baskar said that the state government would stand by the students and ‘safeguard their rights’.

He also said that as the court direction was to the CBSE, it was not necessary for the State to file a caveat despite the Health Secretary being a respondent in the order.

The Madras HC order came after the MP had filed a petition in the HC seeking the court to direct the government to conduct medical admissions in Tamil Nadu based solely on Class XII marks or award 196 grace marks to students who had attempted the test in Tamil.

The court had then directed the CBSE to award 196 marks – four marks each for the 49 questions that were mistranslated in the Tamil question paper.

The court also ordered the CBSE to release a revised rank list based on the new marks within two weeks.

This move by the Madras HC bench will benefit around 24,000 students who had taken the NEET in Tamil.