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What is the News?
The Supreme Court has allowed the commencement of the counselling process for NEET-PG and NEET-UG for 2021-22 admissions on the basis of the existing 27% quota for Other Backward Classes (OBC) and 10% reservation for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) in the All India Quota(AIQ).
What was the issue?
A petition was filed in the Supreme Court challenging the 27% and 10% reservation for the OBC and EWS categories respectively while filling 15% undergraduate and 50% postgraduate AIQ seats under NEET.
On this petition, the Supreme Court raises questions about the ₹ 8 lakh income limit to identify the EWS category.
| Read here: Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) in India – Explained, pointwise |
What is the Supreme Court decision now?
Firstly, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of 27% OBC reservation. There won’t be a further hearing on this aspect.
Secondly, on the criteria to determine the EWS (Rupees 8 lakhs gross annual income cut-off), the Court allowed the existing criteria to operate for the current admission year so as to not delay the admission process further.
However, future application of EWS criteria will be subject to the final decision of the Supreme Court.
Source: This post is based on the article ‘NEET counselling can begin under existing EWS criteria: Supreme Court’ published in The Hindu on 8th Jan 2022.
