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SC turns down plea of PwD medical aspirant

SC turns down plea of PwD medical aspirant

AmitAnand.Choudhary@timesgroup.com

18.12.2022

New Delhi : The Supreme Court has turned down a plea of a medical education aspirant, who is suffering from congenital absence of four fingers of the left hand, seeking direction to allow her to get admission in MBBS course, which was denied to her due to her disability. A bench of Justices BR Gavai and Vikram Nath said that it would not be possible for a person to carry out surgery and other functions of a doctor with such a disability.

The court sympathized with the petitioner but said that it could not allow her plea. Advocate Govind Jee, appearing for the 19-year old girl from Gujarat, tried to convince the bench that she could effectively discharge the duty of a doctor and her disability would not come in her way. He said that the Gujarat high court wrongly dismissed her plea and pleaded the court to consider her petition.

“How can you become a doctor with such a disability? We have all the sympathy for you but we cannot allow it. We have also to think about the patients,” the bench said while turning down her plea. In this case, the student had cracked the medical entrance examination and secured PwD (persons with disabilities) rank 1,335. But she was not allowed to take admission after the medical board found her unfit for the profession.