New Delhi: The Supreme Court has held
that non-minority educational institutions cannot claim to
take in students of only their choice and struck down the
provision of 100 per cent reservation for children of armed
forces in the Army College of Medical Sciences (ACMS) in
Delhi.
A Bench comprising Justices B Sudershan Reddy and SS
Nijjar said such institutions would have to follow government
policy of reservation to weaker section of society.
"The inherited social, educational, cultural,
political and economic disadvantages of vast swaths of
humanity in our country are propagated across generations. A
system that predominantly results in giving access to only
certain groups would necessarily work towards sustenance of
those inequalities," the bench said.
It passed the order on petitions filed by the Indian
Medical Association and students challenging the Delhi
government`s approval to admission process of ACMS for giving
admission only to wards of serving and former Army personnel.
The notification issued by the Government permitting
the Army College of Medical Sciences to allocate hundred
per cent seats for admission to wards of Army personnel in
accordance with the policy followed by the Indian Army is
ultra-vires and also unconstitutional," the bench said.
"To claim a right to distribute knowledge only to a
few, who are selected on the basis of tests which do not
reveal the true talents spread across diverse groups, and
communities in this country, is to destroy the very foundation
by which such non-minority educational institutions are given
access to knowledge," the court said.
"The knowledge that non-minority educational
institutions seek to impart, is not knowledge that they have
created. That knowledge was shared by people who have
generated such knowledge out of love for humanity," the court
said.
"To partake of knowledge, from the common pool, that
is a gift of humanity, including our common ancestors, to all
of humanity, and then to deny the responsibility to share it
with the best amongst youngsters who are located in diverse
groups would be a betrayal of humanity," the court said.
PTI
