ORDER :

1. This is an Interlocutory Application filed on behalf of the Director General of Health Services, Government of India, with a prayer for modification of the Order passed by this Court on.04.1993.

2. Mr. Ashok Bhan, learned Senior Counsel along with other counsel appeared on behalf of the Applicant/Respondent. Dr. Sanjay Shrivastava, Assistant Director General (Medical Education), Directorate General of Health Services, Government of India, was also present before us.

3. Vide the aforesaid Order, this Court had approved the modifications as suggested by Director General of Health Services, Government of India and those suggestions i.e. paras to, are incorporated in the said order.

4. The Committee has now gone into details of various aspects of All India Post-Graduate Medical/Dental Entrance Examination and examinations conducted by other Institutions of medical education, with regard to method of counselling. The relevant finding recorded in this regard by the Expert Committee is reproduced hereinbelow:

"To handle counseling of large number of MBBS/BDS/PG Seats, online counseling is necessary. Online counseling is less time consuming. Large number of candidates and their parents will not be required to travel long distances to appear in counseling by personal appearance two/three times."

5. This suggestion has been given on account of modern technology available now in India which will be beneficial to the candidates also.

6. Since the number of seats available under All India quota in both Post-Graduate and Under-Graduate Courses, has increased over the period of time, it is not possible to complete counseling by personal appearance within prescribed time limit. The object for which modifications are sought by the Director General of Health Services, Government of India, are as under :

(1) Since the number of seats available under All India Quota, in both PG and UG courses have increased over the period of time, it is not possible to complete counseling by personal appearance with in prescribed time limit.

(2) Candidates, including Physically Challenged and girls students, and their parents are required to undertake long journey number of times (upto-8 times) within short period of time, causing financial and physical strain to them.

(3) At present there is provision of two rounds of counseling only with participation of relatively less number of candidates (1.4 times in PG and times in UG, of number of available seats). The proposed scheme of online counseling (Online allotment process) provides three rounds of counseling with participation of larger number of candidates. This will also ensure better utilisation of All India Quota PG and UG seats and minimise wastage of All India Quota Seats.

(4) The expenditure on counseling will be almost nil for the candidates and much less for Government.

(5) The online counseling process will be faceless yet fully transparent and fair.

(6) The arrangement for online counseling process will be made by the National Informatics Centre (NIC), a Government of India agency which has rich/extensive experience of conducting online counseling for AIEEE for nearly one decade.

7. Since the modifications were sought with regard to an Order passed by this Court on.04.1993, we considered the matter at length and perused the record. We also found that no notices are required to be sent to any of the parties or the State Governments as the proposed modifications in the said order are only beneficial to the candidates appearing in the said examination. These candidates would not only be saving considerable time if Online Counseling is permitted but would be able to save money as well. It would also have a greater transparency in the whole process.

8. Thus, we modify the order passed by this Court on 22.04.1993. Therefore, condition Nos.1 to, cited in the said order, stand modified as under :

(1) The All India PG Entrance Examination will be conducted on second Sunday of January. The candidates will