Chennai: Tamil Nadu government is still stung by the Madras High Court judgement squashing reservation of 85 per cent of the seats in medical and dental colleges to then students of Tamil Nadu state board. Soon after the judgment was delivered by the Madras High Court, state health minister C Vijayabhaskar said that the government had come out with notification on reservations to protect the interests of the students of the state board and that “the government will challenge the high court order.”

“We are considering taking the appeal to a wider bench of the Madras High Court,” the minister said. Earlier, the Madras High Court quashed the government’s order reserving 85 per cent seats for state board students and 15 per cent for students of other boards in the country. Tamil Nadu is opposed to NEET he said and added that “we are still waiting for President’ assent to two Tamil Nadu bills on NEET.”

In June state government had issued a GO reserving seats for state board students. But this was challenged by a student, C Darnish Kumar, a CBSE student, who maintained that powers to regulate admissions to medical colleges was with only Medical Council of India and no one else. TN government had no right on the matter, he said in the petition seeking directions to the government and medical colleges for setting the order aside.

Quashing the government’s order, Mr Justice K. Ravichandra Baabu directed the medical colleges to consider the petitioner to all the seats available for undergraduate courses in medicine in Tamil Nadu for the academic year 2017-18

The court found the reservation discriminatory among equals, thus violating Article 14 of the Indian Constitution. It also ordered preparation of fresh merit list and counselling on the basis of that list.