JAIPUR: The Rajasthan high court on Wednesday issued notices to the Centre and the state government for not excluding the creamy layer from SC/ST quota in medical admissions. A single-judge bench issued the notices on a petition filed by medical aspirants Sanjay Ninama and others.

Appearing for the petitioners, counsel Shobhit Tiwari said the Supreme Court (SC) had last year — in the case of Jarnail Singh Vs Lachhmi Narayan Gupta — directed the government to enforce the creamy-layer provision in SC/ST categories too, as is done in the case of OBCs. The SC held that excluding the creamy layer from SC/ST reservation did not violate the basic structure of the Constitution, Tiwari submitted.

The petitioners said that in NEET 2019, the respondents were extending reservation benefits to SCs/STs without excluding the creamy layer. They maintained that after the SC ruling, exclusion of creamy layer had become the law of the land and it did not require any specific directions. Despite that, the respondents were proceeding with counselling for MBBS and BDS 2019 without excluding the creamy layer of SCs/STs, they contended. Tiwari argued that if the authorities excluded the creamy layer form reservation in admissions, the petitioners would get in. So, the inaction on the part of the authorities was infringing on their rights.

