The Karnataka High Court on Wednesday dismissed a petition filed by Kanachur Islamic Education Trust, which sought admission of only Sunni Muslims under the management quota of its MBBS course, Times of India has reported.
As per this report, the Mangalore based trust operates the Kanachur College of Medical Sciences, which had petitioned the High Court on 4 July, following the department of medical education’s refusal to allow it to admit only Sunni Muslim students.
As per a New Indian Express report, the trust had written to the medical department in May, asking for allotment of 82 out of 150 seats for Sunnis under its institute’s quota.
According to a report by The Hindu, the bench of Justice A.S. Bopanna and Justice Mohammad Nawaz observed that, allowing a Muslim minority institution to admit students from only one sect would amount to more meritorious Muslim students losing out, owing to them not being Sunnis.
Thus the bench stated that if a non-Sunni Muslim candidate ranks better than a Sunni candidate, then he or she cannot be denied a seat at the Kanachur college. The bench added to the judgement by saying that if such segmentation is allowed in other religions, then a problem would arise in the admission process.
The bench also pointed out that the trust has signed an agreement with the state government where, at least 66 per cent of the seats have to be occupied by students belonging to a minority community. It also cited that in the trust’s supplement deed dated 1 August 2015 it is written that, the trust is setup to benefit not just Sunnis but the Muslim community as a whole.
The trust has said that it is ready to admit students of any community in 25 per cent of its seats.
