No legal right exists to claim admission based on mistakenly issued allotment; restitutionary powers apply only in exceptional circumstances.

JUDGMENT

The prayers in the writ petition are as under;

“i) Issue a writ of mandamus or other appropriate writ or order directing the 2^nd and 4^th respondents to admit the petitioner as per (Ext.P1) allotment letter to the petitioner for admission to the MBBS course at Government Medical College, Manjeri;

ii) Issue a writ of mandamus or other appropriate writ or order directing Respondent 4 to reserve/protect one MBBS seat for the petitioner in Government Medical College, Manjeri, or in any other Government Medical College in Kerala, pending disposal of the writ petition.;

iii) The Hon’ble Court may be pleased to direct the Respondent 4 for the creation of one supernumerary seat solely for the petitioner as an interim measure, to ensure that the petitioner does not irretrievably lose the academic year.”

2. The reliefs are premised on the following averments;

The petitioner is aspiring to secure admission for MBBS in the All India Quota (AIQ for short) based on his rank. After initial allotments were over, the petitioner applied in the stray vacancy round of counselling and was allotted for admission at the Government Medical College, Manjeri. Although petitioner was issued with Ext.P1 allotment letter and reported at the 4^th respondent college for admission, the Principal of the College informed the petitioner that there was an error in the seat matrix and actually no seat, for admitting him existed.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner contends that, having issued the petitioner with an allotment letter in accordance with the option exercised by him, the respondents cannot deny admission on the premise that the allotment letter was issued by mistake. It is contended that denial of admission to the petitioner being grossly illegal and the petitioner having approached this Court at the earliest point of time, the respondents should be directed to create one more seat and accommodate the petitioner. In support of this argument, reliance is placed on the decision in S.Krishna Sradha v. State of Andhra Pradesh and Others [ (2020) 17 SCC 465 ], holding that under exceptional circumstances, exercising the restitutionary power, there can be a direction to increase the number of seats. It is then submitted that as per the NEET UG counselling rules, if a candidate allotted a seat in the stray vacancy round fails to join, he/she will be barred from appearing in the next NEET UG Examination.

4. Learned Government Pleader submits that Ext.P1 allotment letter was issued due to a mistake committed by the 4^th respondent in reporting the number of AIQ seats available in the college. The circumstances under which the mistake occurred is explained as under;

In the Government Medical College, Manjeri the number of MBBS seats was increased to 110 from 2019- 2020 onwards. The AIQ seats, which is 15% of the total seats, comes to 16.5. Therefore, the procedure being adopted is to calculate 16 and 17 seats in the alternative years. As 16 AIQ seats were allotted in 2024-2025, it was assumed that for the academic year 2025-2026, the AIQ intake would be 17 seats. The draft seat matrix for the academic year 2025-2026 was prepared accordingly by showing 17 seats as AIQ quota and 93 seats as State quota. The mistake occurred due to the omission in noting the seat matrix published by the CEE on 19.02.2025, wherein one seat was reserved for Jammu & Kashmir nominee and 16 as AIQ seats. Due to this omission, in the report submitted to the DME on 18.06.2025, the intake of AIQ seats was reported as 17. Subsequently, the Medical Counselling Committee (MCC) directed all institutions to freeze the seat matrix by 16.07.2025 and the freezing was completed in the CEE portal on 06.08.2025. During the stray vacancy round, it was