Judgment

V. R. KRISHNA IYER, J. (for himself and on behalf of O. Chinappa Reddy, J.)

( 1 ) MANY a case in this Court is the dramatisation on the forensic stage, of social stress or community conflict which seeks resolution or release through the litigative process. This writ petition turns the focus on one such tense issue and ventilates a widespread grievance which deserves constitutional examination.

( 2 ) THE petitioner, Dr. Ramesh, is a medical graduate from the Madras University. His father, an officer under the Central Government, was transferred to Delhi and son, desirous of taking a post-graduate degree in Dermatology, applied for admission to the University of Delhi which offers that course. He took the common entrance test and secured enough marks to qualify for admission but was turned down because of a rule reserving 70 of the seats, at the post-graudate level, to Delhi graduates (if we may use that abbreviation for describing student-applicants who have taken their M. B. B. S. degree from the University of Delhi ). The remaining 30 was open to all, including graduates of Delhi. This rule was made in April 1978 in modification of the earlier reservation of 48 .

( 3 ) HAD this inflation (from 48 to 70 plus) not been made, the petitioner admittedly would have been granted admission. So what blocked his right to post-graduate entry was this rule of institutional quota of 70 which accorded a disproportionate premium in favour of Delhi graduates. The other petitioners are no longer in the race having secured lesser marks at the entrance test, and so the judicial lens must be fixed on the validity of such a considerable reservation or virtual monopoly for the Delhi graduates. The petitioner challenges its vires as violative of Article 14 to 16 and seeks the courts writ to direct the respondent University to admit him to the M. D. course (Dermatology ). While litigating for his right to a seat in the post-graduate degree course in Dermatology, he is now doing his diploma course in the same subject in the same University, which is inferior to his aspiration and entitlement if the right to equality is fatal to the quota policy.

( 4 ) WE are not investigating the plea based on Article 16 because it is not clear whether the stipend paid to a post-graduate student makes the course an employment and, apart from that, the meat of the matter is whether there is discrimination. If there is, Articles 14 and 15 are lethal enough, without resort to Article 16.

( 5 ) THE University of Delhi (we may use the shorthand form delhi University hereafter) refutes this challenge and justifies the reservation in the concrete educational plight of Delhi graduates as an inevitable evil, if it be evil because of the exclusivism practised by every other university. An institutional quota is not invariably a constitutional anathema and, in the present case, the Delhi University offers an explanation for this recourse to higher institutional reservation. Many universities now adopt the exclusionary or segragative device of de facto monopoly of seats for higher medical courses to its own alumni, Indians from other Indian Universities being treated as aliens. This xenophobic trend has forced the Delhi University to reciprocate with high reservation.

( 6 ) IF reservation of seats, as a strategy of admission to technical colleges, is void there may be a wider impact on a number of the institutions and individuals than on the parties here. The law laid down by this Court binds other institutions because Article 141 is imperative. Sri Shanti Bhushan, appearing for the University, assertively suggested to the contrary remembering only the rule of res judicata, but later realised the obvious error and recanted. He agreed that if this Court invalidated reservation, as such, many universities would be upset in their admission processes, although they were not party - a weakness of the adversary system which needs remedying. So, we invited the learned Atto