Dr. Snehelata Patnaik and Ors. v. State of Orissa and Ors.

Judgment

The Judgment of the Court was delivered by KANIA, CJ. We have already dismissed the writ petition and special leave petitjons by our order dated 5.12.1991. We would, however, like to make a suggestion to the authorities for their consideration that some preference might be given to in-service candidates who have done five years of rural service. In the first place, it is possible that the facilities for keeping up with the latest medical literature might not be available to . such in-service candidates and the nature of their work makes it difficult for them to acquire knowledge about very recent medical research which the candidates who have come after freshly passing their graduation· examination might have. Moreover, it might act as an incentive to doctors who had done their graduation to do.noral service for some time. Keeping_ in mind the fact that the rural areas had. suffered grievously for nonavailability of qualified doctors giving such incentive would be quite in order.

Leamed counsel for the respondents has, however, drawn our attention to the decision of a Division Bench of two learned judges of this Court in /Jr. Dinesh Kumar & Ors. v. Mori/al Nehm Meclica/ College, Allahabad & Ors., (1986) 3 SCC page 727 at 740. It has been observed there that merely by offering a weightage of 15 per cent to a doctor for three years rural service would not bring about a migration of doctors from the urban to rural areas. They observed that if you want to produce doctors who are MD or MS, particularly surgeons, who are going to operate upon human beings, it is of utmost importance that the selection should be based on merit. Learned Judges have gone on to observe that no weightage should be given to a candidate for rnral service rendered by him so far as admissions to post-graduate courses are concerned (see para 12 at page 741). In our opinion, this observation certainly does not constitute the ratio of the decision.

The decision is in no way dependent upon these DR. S. PATNAIK v. STATE [KANIA, Cl.] observations. Moreover, those observations are ·in connection with All India Selection and do not have equal force when applied to selection from a single State. These observations, ho"".ever, suggest that the weigbtage to be given must be the bare minimum required to meet the situation. In these circumstances, we are of the view that the authorities might well consider giving weightage upto a maximum of 5 per cent of marks in favour of in-service candidates who have done rural service for five years or .more. The actual percentage would certainly have to be left to the authorities. We also clarify that these suggestions do not in any way ·.. confer any legal right on in-serv.ice students who hiive done rural service nor do the suggestions have any application ·to the selection of the stu- . dents upto the end of this year. V.P.R. Petitions disposed of.