Kerala High Court upholds MCI order for equal stipend to all PG medical students
Kochi: Kerala High Court on Friday upheld a Medical Council of India order directing private medical colleges to pay stipend to medical PG students on par with that paid in government medical colleges.
The court dismissed a petition filed by the Association of the Mana-gements of Christian Professional Colleges challenging the MCI order.
Justice A.V. Ramakrishna Pillai held that there were no infringements in the MCI order on the minority right of the petitioners. It was common knowledge that PG students, with basic degree in medicine, have major work load of patient care in hospital and also teach MBBS students.
Therefore, it was important that the PG students are remunerated uniformly and it was the duty of the authority to see that they are not exploited by any of the medical institution, the court said.
The petitioners claimed that they did not collect money as donation or capitation fee for PG courses. The colleges under the association are paying reasonable amount as stipend.
But, it could not accept the condition that they should pay stipend at the rate paid in government medical colleges. In Kerala, the average stip-end paid to PG students in government medical college is Rs 33,000 per month. The petitioners argued that if such payment is insisted on, it would go beyond the total fees collected from the students in certain cases.
Only state can fix retirement age
The Kerala High Court on Friday observed that only the government could fix retirement age of state government employees.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice A.M. Shaffique passed the order stating that it could not declare a particular age of retirement for government employees, nor could it issue a writ of mandamus to increase the age of retirement to 60 years.
“It is for the government to consider and take appropriate decision,” the court held. The Bench closed the petitions filed by M. Sajeevan, joint secretary to the government, law department.
The petitioner submitted that the age of retirement in the state had been fixed as 55 years some decades ago and only over the last two years it had been increased to 56 years.
Notice on absent counsel recalled
Bringing the curtains down on a two-day saga, the High Court Division Bench headed by Justice K.T. Sankaran on Friday recalled its earlier order issuing notice to the appellants in the criminal appeal after their counsel were not present for the hearing.
John Varghese, president of the Kerala High Court Advocate Association, submitted before the court that the absence of counsel before the court on Wednesday and Thursday was not deliberate.
He submitted that many counsel rely on the list published on the court website and that the list of cases in Court 2B was not mentioned, The counsel was under the impression that there was no sitting in the court and that resulted in their failure to appear before the court.
He further submitted that there would be no instance where the court will be unable to function because of the absence of the counsel.
The court also observed that the cases posted for final hearing before the court were not published as daily listed cases.
