LPA 599/2010 Page 1 of 19

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI

Judgment reserved on: 21^st February, 2011

Judgment delivered on: 3^rd March, 2011

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LPA 599/2010

VARUN KUMAR AGARWAL

... Appellant

Through

Mr.Arvind K. Nigam, Sr. Adv.

with Mr. Rohit Singh, Mr.Abdesh

Chaudhary,

Mr.Raghu

Tandon,

Advocates

versus

UNION OF INDIA & ORS

... Respondents

Through

Mr.A.S. Chandhiok, ASG with

Mr.B.V. Niren, Mr.Sandeep Bajaj,

Advs. for Respondent Nos. 1 & 2

Mr. Mehmood Pracha, Standing

Counsel and Mr.Sandeep Mittal,

Adv. for Respondent Nos. 3 & 4

CORAM:

HON'BLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE

HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SANJIV KHANNA

1.Whether reporters of the local papers be allowed to see the judgment? Yes

2.To be referred to the Reporter or not? Yes

3.Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? Yes

DIPAK MISRA, CJ

In this intra-court appeal, the assail is to the order dated 9^th August,

2010 passed by the learned Single Judge in WP (C) No. 4272/2010

whereby he had declined to accede to the reliefs sought by the writ

petitioner (hereinafter referred to as „the appellant‟), principally the relief

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to give him admission in MS/MD course at All India Institute of Medical

Sciences (AIIMS).

2. Sans unnecessary details, the facts which are necessary to be stated

for disposal of the present appeal are that the appellant had appeared in

the entrance examination held by the AIIMS for admission to the post

graduate course commencing in the academic session in July, 2010. The

appellant had secured 179 rank in the merit list and was called for

counselling. As pleaded in the writ petition, the original counselling was

scheduled for 11^th June, 2010 but was postponed to 18^th June, 2010 due to

difference of opinion between the Respondent No.2 – Director General of

Medical Education (DGME) and the Respondent No.3 – AIIMS. It was

contended that the AIIMS had filled up the seats by students who were

not eligible to be admitted. It was also averred that the AIIMS had

expanded the zone of consideration of the students by changing the

contents of the prospectus which was not permissible; that the students

who had already taken admission in other colleges were called for

counselling; that a maladroit attempt had been made to accommodate the

AIIMS students by deviating the procedure which was impermissible;

that some students had taken admission by misrepresentation inasmuch as

while they had taken admission in other colleges, they had not clearly so

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stated.

3. The said assertions were opposed by the respondents contending,

inter alia, that the prospectus uses the words “are pursuing” which is

more than taking admission since the term „pursue‟ has a different

meaning, namely, carry on further or continue a course of action; that

there had been no ingenious effort to accommodate the students of

AIIMS; that the seats have been filled as per the prescribed procedure;

that the seats are not allowed to go waste; and that it is the principle of

AIIMS to attract the best talent in the country.

4. The learned Single Judge dealt with all the aforesaid aspects and

did not find any merit in any of the grounds and, accordingly, dismissed

the writ petition.

5. This Court, in course of the appeal, on 6^th December, 2010, had

passed the following order:

“…..In course of hearing of this appeal, the issues that

emerge for consideration fundamentally are whether the

third respondent, name