Rajasthan HC Sets Aside Medical Board's Ineligibility Finding Against PwBD MBBS Student, Cites Absence of Reasoned Assessment

A disabled MBBS student already in his third year was declared ineligible without reasons or assessment of assistive devices; the Rajasthan High Court found that legally indefensible.

The Rajasthan High Court at Jodhpur has allowed a writ petition filed by Mukul Vairagi, a student with 66% locomotor disability of the left upper limb, who was blocked from participating in NEET UG 2023 counselling and later, after a court-directed re-assessment, again declared ineligible to pursue the MBBS course by a Medical Board at SMS Medical College, Jaipur. Dr. Justice Nupur Bhati, sitting singly, found the Board's report legally insufficient on multiple grounds: it gave no specific reasons for ineligibility, failed to assess whether the petitioner's dominant right hand was functional, and ignored the possibility of assistive devices or reasonable accommodation. The court set aside the ineligibility finding and directed the respondents to permit Vairagi to continue the MBBS course, treating him as eligible. The judgment, dated 14 August 2026, applies the standards the Supreme Court laid down in Omkar Ramchandra Gond v. Union of India & Ors. (2024 SCC OnLine SC 2860) and Anmol v. Union of India & Ors. (2025 SCC OnLine SC 387).

How Vairagi Was Blocked From Counselling

Vairagi, a resident of Udaipur, appeared in the NEET UG examination held on 7 May 2023 under the PwBD (Persons with Benchmark Disabilities) category. He chose not to use a scribe, as he could write independently. He scored 268 out of 720, and his result was declared on 13 June 2023.

Following a Medical Counseling Committee notice dated 5 July 2023, Vairagi obtained a disability certificate from Vardhman Mahavir Medical College and Safdarjung Hospital, New Delhi on 26 July 2023. The certificate recorded 66% locomotor disability — within the 40–80% eligibility range prescribed under a notification dated 4 February 2019 — but appended a note declaring him “not eligible to pursue medical course due to congenital deformity of left upper limb.”

Despite his name appearing at serial number 26 in the provisional PwBD category list issued by the Chairman, NEET, Rajasthan, Vairagi was blocked from the online counselling process solely on the basis of that note. He submitted representations to the Medical Counseling Committee and the NEET UG Counselling Board but received no relief. With the first round of counselling scheduled for 20–25 July 2023 and second-round registration from 9–14 August 2023, he filed the writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India seeking permission to participate in counselling and an MBBS seat under the 5% PwBD reservation.

Vairagi's case before the court was that only his left hand was affected while his right hand remained fully functional. He also challenged the eligibility criteria in Appendix H-I of the Information Booklet — which required both hands to be intact with sufficient strength and range of motion — as having been introduced after the examination and as violative of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016.

Court-Directed Re-Assessment and Its Outcome

Earlier in the proceedings, this court had noted that the disability certificate from Vardhman Mahavir Medical College contained no reasons for the ineligibility finding. By order dated 4 February 2026, the court directed the respondents to re-assess Vairagi's disability at a designated centre in Rajasthan.

In compliance with that direction, a Medical Board was constituted on 18 February 2026 at SMS Medical College, Jaipur. The Board examined Vairagi through clinical simulations, assessed functional competency, and recorded that functions of his left hand were “grossly impaired” and that he performed “most of the activities with considerable difficulty.” It certified him ineligible to pursue the MBBS course.

By the time the court took up the matter for final decision, Vairagi was already in his third year of MBBS at RNT Medical College, Udaipur. He had cleared his first-year MBBS examinations in August 2024 and his second-year MBBS examinations in July 2025, securing first division in both years, including in both theory and practical components.

Why the Board's Report Did Not Meet the Legal Standard

The court framed the core question as whether the Medical Board's conclusion satisfied the parameters laid down by the Supreme Court in Omkar Ramchandra Gond. That judgment required disability assessment boards to positively record whether a candidate's disability would or would not come in the way of pursuing the course, and to state cogent reasons when the conclusion was negative. It also held that such negative findings are amenable to judicial review, and that in such proceedings the High Court should refer the matter to a premier medical institute for an independent opinion, with relief to be granted or denied based on that opinion.

The Supreme Court reiterated and expanded these requirements in Anmol, directing that assessments must consider whether a candidate, with the aid of modern scientific tools and devices, can pursue the MBBS programme. Anmol also directed that fresh NMC guidelines must include persons with disability or experts conversant with disability rights in the assessment committee.

Applying these standards, Justice Bhati identified several specific deficiencies in the SMS Medical College Board's report.

The report did not identify which specific functional competencies Vairagi was unable to perform. It did not explain the nexus between the observed limitations and the conclusion of ineligibility. It did not address whether assistive devices, adaptive techniques, or reasonable accommodation could address his functional limitations. Critically, the report made no assessment of Vairagi's dominant right hand — the hand unaffected by his disability — even though the petitioner had specifically stated that his right hand was fully functional. The NMC's own interim guidelines issued by public notice dated 19 July 2025 for the academic session 2025–26 contemplate assessment of dominant hand functionality, including the ability to write and hold instruments using the dominant or aided hand. The Board's omission of this assessment was, in the court's view, a material failing.

On the constitution of the Board, the court noted that the respondents had placed nothing on record to show that any Board member possessed specialised expertise in the rights of persons with disability, as required by the directions in Anmol. Expertise in orthopaedics alone, the court held, cannot be presumed to establish such expertise, particularly when the report itself did not demonstrate that the assessment followed the functional and disability-rights framework the Supreme Court had mandated.

The court was careful to confine its interference. It observed that it cannot substitute its own medical opinion for that of a Medical Board, but that judicial review in this context is directed at the legality and adequacy of the decision-making process. On that basis, the impugned reports — Annex. 5 and Annex. 3 dated 17 February 2026 — were found to be deficient in law.

The court also treated as a relevant circumstance the fact that Vairagi had already been promoted to the third year of MBBS and had cleared both first-year and second-year examinations, in theory and practicals, at the first attempt. Nothing in the record showed this circumstance had been taken into account by the Board.

Order

The writ petition was allowed. The court set aside the Medical Board's report to the extent it declared Vairagi ineligible to pursue the MBBS course. The respondents — the State of Rajasthan, the Director of Medical Education, the Chairman of the NEET UG Counselling Board Rajasthan, the Medical Council of India, and the Medical Counseling Committee — were directed to permit Vairagi to continue the MBBS course, treating him as eligible. No order as to costs was made.