SC to Hear Plea to Consider NEET EWS Quota Validity in May Second Week

The petition regarding the validity of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) criteria for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) candidates will be heard by the Supreme Court in the second week of May. The criteria states Rs 8 lakhs as the upper limit of the annual income to avail of EWS quota for admissions to medical colleges.

The NEET PG 2022 is scheduled for May 23 while the results will be out on May 30. Senior Advocate Arvind Datar has requested the bench Justices DY Chandrachud and Bela M Trivedi to hear the matter urgently since their is not much time left for the exam, reported Live Law.

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On January 7, the Supreme Court had allowed the counseling process for NEET PG and UG to begin for admissions to the 2021-22 academic session. This was on the basis of the existing 27 per cent quota for Other Backward Classes (OBC) and 10 per cent reservation for EWS in the All India Quota.

Thereafter, the court upheld the constitutionality of 27 per cent OBC reservation while for EWS, the top court said the existing criteria of 10 per cent will be considered for admission to the current year so as to not delay the admission process any further. SC had listed the matter with regards to the criteria determined by the Pandey committee for identifying the EWS for the future for March 2022 while allowing the MCC to follow the criteria and conduct the counselling.

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Formed by the Centre, the Pandey Committee had revised the criteria of the EWS reservation. After which, it recommended the retention of the annual income criteria of Rs 8 lakhs but recommended the exclusion of family who has agricultural land of five acres and above, irrespective of their annual income. It also recommended removing the criteria with regards to residential assets but said that these revisions be applied from the next academic year.

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