A view of the High Court of Karnataka.
While staying the National Medical Commission’s (NMC) decision of not permitting students to the first-year MBBS course for 2025-26 in the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College (JNMC), Belagavi, based on bribery allegations, the High Court of Karnataka has directed the inclusion of 200 medical seats for allotment through the ongoing counselling for admission to undergraduate medical courses.
A Division Bench comprising Justice S.R. Krishna Kumar and Justice C.M. Poonacha passed the order on August 29 on a petition filed by KLE Academy of Higher Education and Research, a deemed-to-be-university, which runs JNMC.
The Bench permitted admission to the MBBS course by relying on a recent order passed by the Supreme Court which, in the case of NMC vs Shyamlal Chandrashekhar Medical College and SPNM Hospital, Khagaria, Bihar, had permitted admission for the academic year 2025-26 during the pendency of a criminal case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on the charge of bribery for securing enhancement of MBBS seats.
The Supreme Court had stated that “registration of a FIR per se is not a sufficient or valid ground to withhold the Letter of Permission for a college… if the NMC is otherwise satisfied that the college and hospital possess the requisite infrastructure, facilities and amenities, as per the prescribed norms, for imparting the professional education to the said number of 100 students…”
As the NMC’s refusal to grant permission to JNMC was also based on a FIR registered by the CBI after a West Bengal-based senior doctor, who is an assessor for NMC, was caught red-handed while accepting a bribe of ₹10 lakh for alleged enhancement of medical seats, the Bench said that JNMC cannot be prevented from admitting students for the academic year 2025-26 as records indicate that JNMC had already rectified the deficiencies identified by the NMC earlier.
However, the Bench made it clear permission granted to admit students for 2025-26 would not come in the way of the criminal proceedings pending before the CBI in which some officials of the JNMC/KLE Society were named as accused persons.
Also, the Bench has given specific direction to the Medical Counselling Committee, New Delhi, to take steps to include 188 MBBS seats for allotment through its all-India counselling to JNMC, while directing the Karnataka Examinations Authority to include 12 MBBS seats for allotment under the State quota seats.
It was contended on behalf of the KLE that CBI’s “source report and FIR” neither specifically named the JNMC or KLE nor have any allegation been levelled against them.
Published – September 03, 2025 12:45 am IST
