ANITA KISHANRAO VIDEKAR Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This group of petitions challenges action on the part of the Respondent authorities, particularly, National Board of Examination (Respondent No.3), in holding that the Petitioners were not eligible to pursue Secondary Diplomate of National Board ("DNB") course on the basis of qualifying diploma courses completed by the Petitioners.

(2.) The Petitioners in these petitions are all holders of MBBS Degree from different medical colleges. After obtaining such degree, they proceeded to undertake and complete post graduate diploma courses in medicine or surgery, as the case may be, conducted by College of Physicians and Surgeons, Bombay. These diploma courses, conducted by the College of Physicians and Surgeons, have since long been recognized as intermediate post graduate qualifications. A pre-constitution law, Indian Medical Degrees Act, 1916, which had the assent of Governor General of India on 16 March 2016, recognized diplomas awarded by the College of Physicians and Surgeons as a recognized qualification, along with three other catagories of organizations/colleges, for prosecuting Western Medical Science including Allopathic Medicine. By a stroke of luck, the specifics of which we need not go into for the purpose of these petitions, suddenly by a Notification issued on 2 December 2009 by the Union Government, various post graduate diploma courses conducted by the College of Physicians and Surgeons came to be de-recognized. This state of affairs continued till about 17 December 2017. By a Notification dated 17 January 2017, issued by Union Government, after consulting Medical Council of India, recognition of individual post graduate diploma courses conducted by the College of Physicians and Surgeons came to be restored through an amendment to the First Schedule of Medical Council of India Act. Various individual diplomas granted by the College of Physicians and Surgeons, ever since December 2009, came to be included once again as recognized medical qualifications. (In case of some of these diplomas, the recognition was for diplomas conferred after March 2012.) The individual Petitioners before us had, on the basis of diplomas held by them through College of Physicians and Surgeons, applied for admission to Secondary DNB course, which is a post graduate course of two years and which requires as a qualifying condition for admission holding of a recognised post graduate diploma. Based on the recognition granted by Notification of 17 January 2017, the Petitioners were considered eligible for appearing at a Common Entrance Test ("CET") for admission to Secondary DNB course. Even their results at CET were declared accordingly. So far so good. Subsequent to their having cleared CET, Union of India proceeded to issue yet another notification, Notification dated 22 January 2018 (Gazetted on 12 February 2018), once again de-recognising the diplomas awarded by the College of Physicians and Surgeons. As a result of this last Notification, Respondent No.3-Board refused to permit the Petitioners to undertake the Secondary DNB course any further. This led to the Petitioners filing the present group of petitions.

(3.) By a recent order, passed on 10 April 2018, a Division Bench of this court directed the Respondents to permit the Petitioners to go ahead with the Secondary DNB course as per the original Notification dated 17 October 2017. No doubt, the Division Bench made it clear that the fate of the course undertaken by the Petitioners would be subject to the results of the petitions. The Petitioners, in any event, went ahead and participated in the course, some of them having already completed the course and even procured Secondary DNB qualification based on their individual results. Some have even enrolled and registered themselves as Practitioners with DNB qualification and even started practicing accordingly. In case of a few Petitioners, who could not clear the Secondary DNB examination in first attempt, they were, however, held to be un-qualified for appearing at the re-examination, on account of derecognition of their diplomas awarded by the College of Physicians and Surgeons on 22 January 2018, purportedly on the ground that the present petitions were not finally decided by this court. That is where the matter stands today as we take up these petitions for final hearing.