New Delhi: The Supreme Court has held that the Admission Supervisory Committee in Kerala has the jurisdiction to intervene and if necessary initiate proceedings suo motu with regard to the admission process of the self-financing medical colleges in the State.

The Supreme Court Bench, consisting of Justices L Nageswara Rao and Abhay S Oka, pronounced the landmark verdict in the case related to admission of students in the Kannur and Karuna Self-financing Medical Colleges.

Qualified MBBS students to get certificates
The Court also ordered the Kerala University of Health Sciences to give certificates to the MBBS students who qualified after completing the course from these two colleges on the basis of the interim order passed by the Supreme Court earlier.

The students got admission to the two colleges during the 2015-16 batch based on the Kerala Medical Entrance Examination. But when the names of these students were sent to the university, the Admission Supervisory Committee questioned the credentials of these students .

The two college managements then approached the High Court of Kerala. They argued that they had done the admission from the government list, and hence, the supervisory committee could not suo moto take any action.

Though the High Court dismissed this petition, the Supreme Court stayed the HC order while hearing the appeal filed by the college managements. The Supreme Court also ruled that the student could continue their studies in the two colleges.

Though the students completed their MBBS programme and internship as per the Supreme Court order, the university did not issue degree certificates because of the objections raised by the supervisory committee. At this juncture, the affected students also approached the Supreme Court, by arguing that the denial of the certificate would affect their future.

The counsels for the management advocates Maninder Singh and Haris Beeran argued that the supervisory committee was functioning based on non-existent rules. But, advocates Jayadeep Gupta and C K Sasi, who appeared for the supervisory committee, argued that the committee had extensive powers to deal with admission issues. Advocate V Giri appeared for the students.