The Bombay High Court has granted relief to Suyash Patil, an 18-year-old medical aspirant with multiple disabilities, by directing the Government Medical College in Jalna to admit him under a supernumerary quota for the academic year 2024-25. This decision came after Patil, who hails from Sangli district, was initially denied admission under the persons with disabilities (PwD) quota due to his hearing impairment exceeding the 40% threshold set by the National Medical Commission (NMC) in a 2019 notification.
Justice AS Chandurkar and Justice MM Sathaye of the division bench took a significant step by ordering the creation of an additional post specifically for Patil, circumventing the regular admission process. Patil, who had appeared for the NEET-UG 2024 exam as a PwD candidate, faced rejection from the medical college on the basis of his disability level. He subsequently approached the high court, seeking a declaration of his eligibility to pursue an MBBS degree.
Following the court’s directive, a three-member panel of doctors at the Grant Medical College and Sir JJ Group of Hospitals re-evaluated Patil on September 18, 2024, affirming that his speech and language impairments were indeed above 40%, which would traditionally render him ineligible for the course. However, a pivotal Supreme Court ruling on October 17, 2024, in the Omkar Gond case, emphasized that a disabled applicant’s functional ability to pursue a medical course should be the primary criterion for eligibility.
Acting on this precedent, the high court instructed the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Nagpur to assess Patil’s functional ability. Meanwhile, the Government Medical College in Jalna was ordered to provisionally admit him. The NEET Disability Certification Medical Board (DCMB) at AIIMS, Nagpur, subsequently certified on October 23, 2024, that Patil was capable of pursuing medical education, though he did not qualify for admission under the PwD quota.
The justices expressed their disapproval of the medical board’s approach, stating that the board was only meant to assess Patil’s capability to undertake medical studies, not to reassess his disability percentage, which had already been quantified at 58% earlier on August 6, 2024.
