SC dismisses 441 BDS students’ plea

Tribune News Service

Faridkot, July 11

The Supreme Court has dismissed the special leave petition (SLP) of 441 students of Bachelor of Dental Science (BDS) course of the state.

The 441 students approached the SC on July 8 after the Single and the Double Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court held on June 15 and July 2 that their admission to 12 private dental colleges in the state was invalid. However, the Supreme Court denied the students any relief on July 9.

Now that the 441 students are set to lose another academic year, many students have filed a ‘mercy’ petition to the Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFUHS) and the state government.

However, the BFUHS has declined to consider the plea. The university had been strongly opposing the admission of these students for the last year, terming these admissions as ‘illegal’.

These students were admitted to private dental colleges in the 2014-15 academic session on the basis of their Class XII marks even though clearing the All-India Common Entrance Test or any entrance examination conducted by the state government was mandatory.

Dr Raj Bahadur, Vice-Chancellor, BFUHS, said, “We repeatedly cautioned these students and colleges that the admissions were ‘illegal’, but they paid no heed to our warnings. The students got admitted to 12 dental colleges in September 2014.”

When the BFUHS refused to accept these students’ applications for registration, they approached the high court. However on June 15, the single bench held that these admissions were granted in gross violation of the state government’s notification of March 7, 2014.

Thereafter, some students approached the Division Bench, which rejected their plea on July 2. It directed the private colleges to refund the entire fee to each student and give them Rs 50,000 each as interim relief.

Now that the Supreme Court has dismissed their SLP, students are set to lose another year as they did not take any medical entrance test this year.