PANAJI
The Bombay High Court at Goa has dismissed a petition seeking to revoke the admission granted to an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) at the Goa Medical College on grounds of ineligibility ruling that the college administration had correctly granted her the seat since it was available to both Non-Resident Indians as well as OCI citizens.
A student approached the High Court arguing that any applicant who seeks admission to the NRI quota must possess an Indian passport and must have passed the qualifying examination from schools to colleges located outside India in a country of his/her residence.
The petitioner argued that the student who was granted the seat, neither holds an Indian passport nor has she passed the qualifying examination from schools/colleges located outside India and as such was not entitled to be admitted against the NRI quota for the first MBBS course.
The state through the Advocate General, however, argued that the prospectus nowhere requires an OCI cardholder to either hold an Indian passport, which is an impossibility or to pass the qualifying examination outside India. Those conditions are only required to be met for Non-Resident Indians.
OCI/PIO cardholders are considered eligible for admission to seats of the NRI category.
“This category includes NRIs per se, OCI cardholders, and PIO cardholders. Therefore, to insist that even OCI cardholders or PIO cardholders must comply with the conditions prescribed for determining whether an applicant is an NRI would amount to doing violence to the provisions of Clause 6.11 of the Prospectus, as they stand,” the High Court bench of Justices M S Jawalkar and M S Sonak, said.
“Thus construed, we find no infirmity in the Admission Committee or the State government reading and construing Clause 6.11 of the prospectus, in the manner in which they have,” the High Court said.
