On Thursday, Supreme Court allowed the medical aspirants older than 25 years to appear in National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) undergraduate exam 2019 for MBBS and BDS. SC, however, has specified that their final admission will be subject to the final outcome of the case on validity of CBSE’s decision to fix upper age limit.
The official NEET UG 2019 notification was released on November 1. The notification specified the upper age limit for students as 25 years as on the date of the examination. The last date for submitting forms was tomorrow.
SC has extended the last date for submitting the forms by a week to enable aspirants who did not qualify under the earlier age criteria to apply.
The notification mentioned the upper age limit of 25 and 30 years for general and reserved categories respectively to apply for NEET.
This decision has come in the matter of Medical Council of India’s (MCI) decision to keep an upper age limit for NEET for admission to medical colleges. The court had earlier agreed to examine the validity of an amendment to the MCI Regulations on Graduate Medical Education of 1997. The amendment that was notified on January 22, stipulated an upper age limit of 25 years for general category candidates and of 30 years for those belonging to the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes (OBC) as well as those is the physically handicapped categories.
The Delhi High Court on May 11, however, upheld the regulation saying that a 17- or 18-year-old candidate will find it difficult to compete with older and more experienced candidates.
Senior advocate Amarendra Sharan, arguing for the petitioners, said, “The Regulation is bad as per the (MCI Oversight) Committee as well as the central government that has recommended deletion of the upper age limit as the country needs more doctors.”
When the bench noted that the regulations are in exercise of legislative power, Sharan replied, “When candidates secure higher marks, it increases competition, resulting in better doctors.”