Denial of medical seats for OBCs takes political turn

Former union health minister, Dr Anbumani Ramadoss filed a case in the SC on the refusal to allot adequate number of seats for OBCs

Chennai: The Centre’s alleged denial of OBC reservation in the All India quota seats for admission to various medical courses has captured the imagination of the political parties in Tamil Nadu, who are gearing up for a fight against what they call as the ‘social injustice.’

To discuss the issue, an all-party meeting has been called by the DMK President M K Stalin on Sunday, May 31 through video conference. The meeting scheduled for 4.30 pm would also deliberate on the action taken by the Central and State governments to prevent the spread of Coronavirus, said a notification from the DMK headquarters.

However, it is the alleged denial of reservation for OBC candidates in the admissions made through the NEET that is likely to dominate the proceedings of the meeting as Stalin himself had already expressed his displeasure over the issue.

Other political leaders too have taken up the issue with the Centre, saying that it is against the Constitution not to provide for 27 per cent reservation for OBC candidates.

PMK’s youth wing president and former union health minister, Dr Anbumani Ramadoss has filed a case in the Supreme Court on the refusal to allot adequate number of seats for OBCs in medical courses.

According to an analysis of the medical admissions by Anbumani Ramadoss, the practice of allotting the seats reserved for OBCs to the general category began in the academic years 2017-19 and has been going on unabated for four years.  

While the official figures relating to the admission in certain years have not been given clearly by the Ministry concerned, in 2018-19, for the post graduate medical admission, only 220 seats went to OBCs, who were legally entitled for 2,152 seats.

The same year for the undergraduate medical courses, only 66 OBC candidates were given seats while it should have been 1,096.

Ramadoss pointed out that in the 2020 list, the category ‘Economically Weaker Sections’ has been included but the mandatory allotment of seats of OBCs has not been done.

He said the Centre action amounted to gross social injustice as no reservation has been made on the 8800 seats pooled from colleges run by State governments. If the admission had been done by the States, the OBC quota would have been filled as per the law, he said.

Ramadoss has also written to Dr Bhagwan Lal Sahni, the chairperson of the National Commission for Backward Classes, seeking his intervention in the matter.