Supreme Court lashes out at NEET ordinance

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court gave the Modi government another mouthful on Thursday when it lashed out at the recently-promulgated NEET (National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test) ordinance which had allowed states to conduct their own undergraduate medical examinations this year in the face of a court order disallowing it.

A three-judge bench, comprising Justices Anil R Dave, Shivakirti Singh and Adarsh Kumar Goel, however, did not stay the May 24 ordinance saying it would affect lakhs of students. The validity of the ordinance was questionable and ‘patently bad’, expressing unhappiness with the manner in which the government had hastily drawn up the ordinance.

“How could have you done this? It is definitely bad. Patently bad. If we pass any order they (students) will be in total mess. They are our own children. We are worried about their plight. Don’t take an adversarial stand,” Justice Dave told the Attorney General who appeared for the government.

“Prima facie, the validity of the ordinance is open to doubt. However, since 50 per cent of the students have already written the state exams, we do not intend to grant any interim relief,” the bench said in a written order. NGO Sankalp had challenged the ordinance as an attempt by the central government to circumvent the court’s May 9 judgement directing that only NEET conducted by CBSE would be valid throughout the country from this academic year.

The ordinance overturned this legal position, clarifying that NEET would not be mandatory for this academic year and states were free to conduct their own exams. Appearing for the NGO, senior advocate Amarender Sharan argued that the ordinance had in effect implementation of the court order by a year.

No one has the authority to interfere with the court order, he argued.