On July 19, the Supreme Court issued a notice regarding a petition challenging the National Medical Commission’s (NMC) decision to cancel the NEET-Super Speciality Exam (NEET-SS) for 2024. The petition was brought forth by thirteen doctors under Article 32 of the Constitution.
The bench, comprising Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, observed that the NMC’s decision would result in no NEET-SS exam being held for students this year. Notices were issued to the Union Government, the Medical Counselling Committee, and the NMC, with the petitioners also allowed to include the National Board of Examination as a party respondent.
Initially, the Chief Justice questioned the petitioners’ decision to approach the Supreme Court directly under an Article 32 petition. The counsel for the petitioners explained that the exam follows a fixed annual timeline as established by the Supreme Court’s judgement in Ashish Ranjan v. Union of India, which mandates a specific schedule for medical college admissions.
The counsel argued that the cancellation of the NEET-SS 2024 exam was due to delayed admissions for MD, MS, and DMB courses through the NEET-PG exam in the 2021 academic year. These admissions, delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, were conducted from January to May 2022, with course completion pushed to January 2025. To accommodate these students, the NMC decided to postpone the NEET-SS 2024 exam.
The minutes of the NMC meeting, as read by the counsel, stated: “Regarding NEET-SS 2024, it was decided that admissions for the academic year 2021 in MD, MS, and DMB Courses were held in January to May 2022. Therefore, NEET-SS 2024 may not be conducted in the current year. However, the decision on conducting NEET-SS 2024 will be taken later.”
The Supreme Court has scheduled the next hearing for July 26.
