Judgment:
ORDER
M.M. Das, J.
1. Heard learned Counsel for petitioner, learned Counsel for the State representing opposite parties 1 to 3, Mr. G.A.R. Dora, learned Counsel for the opposite party Nos. 4 and 6 and Mr. R. C. Mohanty, learned Counsel appearing for the Medical Council of India.
2. The petitioner in this writ petition has called in questions the legality of fixing the cut-off date as 31-3-2009 in Clause-1. 3 of the prospectus for admission to Post-Graduate Super Speciality Courses at S.C.B. Medical College, Cuttack. He has also prayed for issuance of a writ of mandamus directing the opposite parties 1 to 3 to give admission to the petitioner as against one of the four seats in the said course. Pursuant to the advertisement, the petitioner made an application to appear in the entrance test which was scheduled to be held on 26-6-2009. Such application was made by the petitioner on 21-6-2009. The last date for acceptance of the application was fixed as 22-6-2009. A merit list was published in which the petitioner was placed in serial No. 2 and was called to attend the counselling which was held on 4-7-2009. It is alleged that during the counselling, the petitioner's name was not called and on enquiry he could not ascertain the reason therefor. Being aggrieved by the action of the opposite party No. 3 in not giving him admission t6 one of the seats in Super Speciality Course the petitioner has preferred the present writ petition.
3. Learned Counsel for the petitioner submits that the petitioner was not given admission even though he secured rank No. 2 in the merit list on the ground that he did not acquire the eligible qualification by the cutoff date as fixed in Clause 1.3 of the prospectus. He further submits that though it is given out in the prospectus that the applications from ineligible candidates will be rejected summarily, the petitioner's application form having been accepted and he being issued with the admit card, permitted to appear in the entrance examination, given rank No. 2 in the merit list and called for counselling, the opposite parties 1 to 3 are estopped from not allowing the petitioner to take admission to one of the four seats on the ground that the petitioner is not eligible as per the eligible criteria as have been stated in the counter affidavit. On 3-9-2009, as it was submitted before this Court that the opposite party No. 4 has vacated the seat and the said seat is lying vacant, to which the opposite party No. 4 was admitted, this Court passed an interim order directing that the said seat shall not be filled up, which is still lying vacant.
4. Learned Counsel for the State submits that the cut-off date, i.e. 31-3-2009 as fixed in Clause 1.3 of the Prospectus is an old practice which was being done in, all previous years and in support of such contention, he produced the prospectus of the previous years where also 31st March was fixed as the cutoff date.
5. Mr. R. C. Mohanty, learned Counsel for the Medical Council of India submits that, time schedule for giving admission to such Super Speciality Course as fixed by the Apex Court as well as the M.C.I. is over which is 30-9-2009, and, therefore, the said date fixed being over, any seat remaining vacant or unfilled out of the sanctioned seats, cannot be carried forward for the next academic year. Clause 1.3 of the Prospectus is as follows:
Clause 1.3. Commencement of Session and Duration of Course:The academic session will commence from 1-8-2009 for the year 2009 unless otherwise notified. The duration 6f the course will be for an uninterrupted period of three years. The candidates are required to fulfill the eligibility requirement by 31-3-2009.
The eligibility criteria have been prescribed in Clause 8 of the Prospectus, Which is as follows:
Clause 8 : Eligibility Criteria:8.1 The candidate must be a permanent resident of Orissa and he/she is required to furnish a certificate of 'Permanent resident of Orissa' in the enclosed pro forma (Vide Appendix III) from a revenue officer not below the rank of a Tahsildar of the area concerned.
6. Mr. G.A.R. Dora, learned Counsel for the opposite parties 4 and 6 submits that since opposite party No. 4 has vacated the seat, the rank of opposite party No. 6, who held rank No. 5 should be considered as rank No. 4 and, therefore, his admission cannot be disturbed.
7. The basic question to be determined in this case is as to whether the fixation of the cut-off date in Clause 1.3 as on 31-3-2009 is arbitrary, unreasonable and discriminatory
When a cut-off date, is fixed by the concerned authority, the Court is required to keep in mind that such a date must have been fixed by the authority after considering various aspects of the case and, therefore, there is very limited scope of judicial interference in such matters. This issue has been examined and considered by the Supreme Court time and again in a large number of cases, some of which are Jaila Singh v. State of Rajasthan : AIR 1975 SC 1436; D.S. Nakara v. Union of India : AIR 1983 SC 130; Dr. (Mrs.) Sushma Sharma v. State of Rajasthan : AIR 1985 SC 1367; U.P.M.T.S.N.A. Samiti, Varanasi v. State of Uttar Pradesh : 1987 (2) SCC 453 : AIR 1987 SC 1772; Krishena Kumar v. Union of India : AIR 1990 SC 1782; State of Rajasthan v. Rajasthan Pensioner Samaj : AIR 1991 SC 1743; All India Reserve Bank Retired Officers Association v. Union of India : AIR 1992 SC 767; T.S. Thiruvengadam v. Secretary to the Government of India : (1993) 2 SCC 174 : 1993 AIR SCW 971; Union of India v. Sudhir Kumar Jaiswal : AIR 1994 SC 2750; M. C. Dhingra v. Union of India : (1996) 7 SCC 564 : AIR 1996 SC 2963; University Grants Commission v. Sadhana Chaudhary : (1996) 10 SCC 536 : 1996 AIR SCW 4101 and State of Rajasthan v. Amrit Lal Gandhi : AIR 1997 SC 782 and many others.
8. It is a settled proposition of law that a cut-off date can be introduced, but it is not permissible to introduce such a date in an artificial manner resulting in discrimination between similarly situated persons. A cutoff date may be introduced by creating a fiction, but before fixing such cut-off date, the consequences are required to be examined thoroughly and the date so fixed must have some nexus to the object sought to be achieved and should not result in making an artificial classification between similarly situated persons. If the choice of fixing a particular date is shown to be wholly arbitrary and introduces discrimination, which violates the mandate of Article 14 of the Constitution, such a cut-off date can be struck down for the reason that a purpose of choice unrelated to the object sought to be achieved cannot be accepted as valid.. In a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court in Union of India v. M.V. Valliappan AIR 1999 SC 2526, it has been held that a cut-off date cannot be held to be invalid unless it is shown to be capricious or whimsical and it cannot be held to be so merely in absence of any particular reason for choosing the same. The Court observed as under:
It is settled law that the choice of a date as a basis for classification cannot always be dubbed as arbitrary even if no particular reason is forthcoming for the choice unless it is shown to be capricious or whimsical in the circumstances, while fixing a line of point is necessary and there is no mathematical date or way of fixing it, precisely the decision of the Legislature or its, delegate must be accepted unless it is very wide of reasonable mark (University Grants. Commission v. Sadhana Chaudhary : (1996) 10 SCC 536 : 1996 AIR SCW 4101. The learned Counsel for the respondents was not in a position to point out any ground for holding that the said date is capricious or whimsical in the circumstances of the case.
9. In Bhupinderpal Singh v. State of Punjab : (2000) 5 SCC 262 : AIR 2000 SC 2011 the Supreme Court placed reliance upon large number of its earlier judgments, particularly in Ashok Kumar Sharma v. Chandra Sekhar : (1997) 4 SCC 18; Andhra Pradesh Public Service, Commission v. B. Sharat Chandra : (1990) 2 SCC 669 and M.V. Nair (Dr.) v. Union of India : (1993) 2 SCC 429 : 1993 AIR SCW 1442 and observed as under:
The High Court has held that (i) the cutoff date, by reference of which the eligibility required must be satisfied by the candidate seeking a public employment, is the date appointed by the relevant rules and if there be no cut-off date appointed by the rules then such date, as may be appointed for the purpose in the advertisement seeking for application; (ii) that if there be no such date appointed then the eligibility criteria shall be applied by reference to the last date appointed, by which the application has been received by the Authority. The view taken by the High Court is supported by several decisions of the Court and is, therefore, well settled and hence cannot be found fault with.
10. The said judgment was considered and approved by the Supreme Court in Jasbir Rani v. State of Punjab : (2002) 1 SCC 124 : AIR 2002 SC 60. Similarly, in State of West Bengal v. West Bengal Government Pensioners Association : (2002) 2 SCC 179 : AIR 2002 SC 538, the Supreme Court approved the cut-off date fixed by the State for the purpose of revising the pay scale, observing that the cut-off date cannot be set aside unless on the facts it is proved to be arbitrary and unreasonable.
(Emphasis supplied)
11. In the facts of the instant case, basically two circumstances are to be considered. The first being the eligibility criteria as prescribed in Clause 8 of the prospectus which the petitioner has fulfilled and the second being that the seat to which the petitioner seeks admission is Super Speciality Course and the object to be achieved by the entrance test is to select the most suitable candidates to take admission to such course, so that the State can produce 'quality doctors'. By fixing the cut-off date as 31-3-2009, though the last date for submission of application was 22-6-2009, persons accruing the minimum qualification required to appear in the entrance test after 31-3-2009, but within 22-6-2009 are debarred from appearing in the said test. There can be no distinction between the candidates who have acquired the minimum qualification as prescribed in Clause 8 of the Prospectus prior to 31-3-2009 and after 31-3-2009 but within the last date fixed for submission of the application form.
12. Applying the ratio of the decisions cited above, it would be amply clear that an artificial classification has been made between the doctors, who acquired the minimum qualification to sit in the entrance test prior to 31-3-2009 and the doctors who acquired such qualification after the said date but before the last date fixed for submission of forms. Such a classification violates the mandate of Article 14 of the Constitution inasmuch as the cut-off date fixed has no reasonable nexus with the object to be achieved, i.e. selecting the best candidates. It can further be noted here that the petitioner, in spite of the fact that he produced all his documents along with the application form and though according to the State was found ineligible, was allowed to sit in the entrance test and was placed in the second rank in order of merit in the selection showing that he is more meritorious than the persons placed below him was denied to take admission. Thus, debarring the petitioner from taking admission to the Super Speciality Course, 2009 clearly amounts to discrimination in violation of the mandate of Article 14 of the Constitution,
13. This Court, therefore, has no hesitation to hold that fixing a cut-off date as 31-3-2009 in Clause 1.3 of the Prospectus being arbitrary and unreasonable resulting in violation of Article 14 of the Constitution cannot be sustained. Thus, the said cut-off date fixed as 31-3-2009 is held to be illegal and arbitrary and the petitioner is directed to be given admission to the seat which has been kept vacant pursuant to the interim order passed by this Court earlier. Such admission should be given to him within a period of one week from the date of production of a certified copy of this order before the opposite party No. 3-Principal, S.C.B. Medical College, Cuttack, as it is submitted by Mr. R. C. Mohanty that the last date for giving admission to such course is over since 30-9-2009, but as this writ petition is pending before this Court from 7-7-2009 and could not be disposed of earlier due to intervention of the Puja Vacation inasmuch as no person can be made to suffer due to act of the Court, the above direction is given to give admission to the petitioner.
14. With the aforesaid directions, the writ petition is disposed of.
Urgent certified copy of this order be granted as per Rules.