Allahabad High Court
Aryan Yadav vs State Of U.P. And 2 Others on 28 August, 2025
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:151746-DB
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
WRIT - C No. - 27910 of 2025
Aryan Yadav
.....Petitioner(s)
Versus
State Of U.P. And 2 Others
.....Respondent(s)
Counsel for Petitioner(s)
:
Dhananjai Rai, Vibhu Rai
Counsel for Respondent(s)
:
Akanksha Sharma, C.S.C., Fuzail Ahmad Ansari
Court No. - 39
HON'BLE ARINDAM SINHA, J.
HON'BLE PRASHANT KUMAR, J.
(Per Arindam Sinha, J.)
1. Petitioner had taken the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET)-UG 2025. He belongs to Other Backward Class (OBC), National Cadet Corps (NCC), a horizontally reserved sub-category. His prayer is, there be directed vertical migration of meritorious students of the sub-category, to free up the reserved seats so that he gets one. State and respondent no.2 (the Director) have filed their respective counters. Petitioner has dealt with them in the rejoinder filed. In addition, included in the rejoinder are judgments of the Supreme Court relied upon by petitioner.
2. Mr. Vibhu Rai, learned advocate appears on behalf of petitioner and relies on judgment dated 20th August, 2024 of the Supreme Court in, inter alia, Civil Appeal no.9628 of 2024 arising out of SLP (C) no. 2111 of 2024 (Ram Naresh @ Rinku Kushwah and others Vs. State of Madhya Pradesh and others), paragraph 16, reproduced below.
"16. In view of the settled position of law as laid down by this Court in the case of Saurav Yadav (supra) and reiterated in the case of Sadhana Singh Dangi (supra), the methodology adopted by the respondents in compartmentalizing the different categories in the horizontal reservation and restricting the migration of the meritorious reserved category candidates to the unreserved seats is totally unsustainable. In view of the law laid down by this Court, the meritorious candidates belonging to SC/ST/OBC, who on their own merit, were entitled to be selected against the UR-GS quota, have been denied the seats against the open seats in the GS quota."
(emphasis supplied) He seeks interference.
3. Mr. Rahul Agarwal, learned advocate, Additional Advocate General appears on behalf of respondent no.1 (State). Ms. Akanksha Sharma, learned advocate appears on behalf of respondent no.2 and Mr. Fuzail Ahmad Ansari, learned advocate, Standing Counsel appears on behalf of respondent no.3 (the Testing Agency).
4. Mr. Agarwal hands up judgment of a Division Bench of this Court in Jyoti Shukla Vs. State of U.P. reported in 2017 (3) AWC 2264. He submits, the Bench had occasion to consider vertical reservation from sub-categories providing horizontal reservation. At that time meritorious candidates entitled to horizontal reservation by sub-category were being allowed vertical migration. By the judgment, such candidates stood restricted because horizontal reservation by sub-categories had select seats allotted as compartmentalized in individual colleges. Pursuant to the judgment there stood issued Government Order (GO) dated 18th June, 2025. Thus there came to be executive order enforcing the restriction directed by the judgment.
5. Without prejudice he submits, on handing up his instruction carrying a chart showing the seats allotted with copy to Mr. Rai, NCC candidates have allotted for them in sub-category OBC-NCC, twelve seats. All the seats have been filled up by NCC candidates belonging to category OBC. They have achieved higher marks than petitioner. Other categories like Scheduled Tribe (ST) have lower threshold marks. Petitioner cannot thus migrate to said category as Scheduled Tribe is distinct from OBC category. He opposes the writ petition. The chart appended to the instruction is reproduced below.
UPNEET UG R1 : FF FF FF FF S.No. Total_Seats Allotted_Seats Left_Seats 1 UR 34 34 0 2 OBC 23 23 0 3 SC 22 15 7 4 ST 2 0 2 5 EWS 7 7 0 Total 88 79 9 UPNEET UG R1 : NCC NC NC NC S.No. Total_Seats Allotted_Seats Left_Seats 1 UR 17 17 0 2 OBC 12 12 0 3 SC 11 11 0 4 ST 1 0 1 5 EWS 3 3 0 Total 44 43 1
6. Mr. Rai submits further with reference to the merit list handed up by Mr. Agrawal, up to serial no.17 there are 8 backward class candidates belonging to sub-category OBC-NCC. They have secured sufficiently high marks to be given admission in UR-NCC sub-category. On direction for them to be vertically migrated, 8 seats in the reserved sub-category will become free for further allotment. He reiterates reliance on paragraph 16 in Ram Naresh (supra). Mr. Agrawal submits, attention of the Supreme Court in said case was drawn to the fact that horizontally reserved seats for sub-category of UR candidates, who were from Government Schools (GS), had been released to the UR category of the open pool, bearing lower cut-off mark resulting in inversion of merit. He draws attention to paragraph 6 in the judgment, reproduced below.
"6. Shri Parameshwar, learned Senior Counsel appearing on behalf of the Appellants submitted that the GS quota was introduced by the State of Madhya Pradesh on 10th May 2023. However, the procedure followed by the respondents in sub- classifying the candidates further into categories as UR-GS, SC-GS, ST-GS, OBC-GS and EWS-GS was totally illegal. It is submitted that, in view of the settled position of law as laid down by this Court in the case of Saurav Yadav and Others v. State of Uttar Pradesh and Others. Manu/SC/0960/2020 : 2020:INSC:714 : (2021) 4 SCC 542,, even in case of horizontal reservation, the candidates from the reserved categories like SC/ST/OBC, if they are entitled on their own merit in the GS quota, will have to be admitted against the GS quota (UR seats). He submitted that, on account of erroneous application of policy, an anomalous situation has arisen wherein, in the UR-GS seats, the persons who are much less meritorious than the appellants, who have secured as low as 214, 150 marks, have secured admission, whereas the Appellants, who are much more meritorious than the UR-GS candidates have been deprived the admission. It is submitted that the cut-off for UR-GS was 291, OBC-GS was 465, SC-GS was 314 and EWS-GS was 428. He therefore submitted that, on account of erroneous application of the policy, as many as 77 seats classified as UR-GS, were not filled from the GS quota and had to be released to the open pool of candidates." (emphasis supplied) Mr. Agrawal submits further, in this case cut-off mark for UR-NCC sub-category was 393, while cut-off mark for petitioner's sub-category OBC-NCC was 392. The 12 seats in petitioner's sub-category were filled up by those belonging to that sub-category, as having secured above cut-off mark 392. Furthermore, none of the 8 candidates within serial no. 17 in the merit list, who have obtained admission on basis of horizontal reservation by sub-category UR-NCC, secured marks below the cut off mark 393. He submits, Ram Naresh (supra) is thus distinguishable on facts.
7. Petitioner's contention is that there are selected candidates in sub-category OBC-NCC, who have secured sufficient marks for them to find seats in the sub-category placed immediately vertically upward. Those successful candidates in sub-category OBC-NCC can therefore be moved up to sub-category UR-NCC. Upon appreciating facts in this case, we see that on the successful candidates in sub-category OBC-NCC being moved up vertically to sub-category UR-NCC, by virtue of merit they will displace successful candidates in UR-NCC sub-category. The latter will be rendered to be reckoned with candidates in UR category. For ascertaining whether those displaced candidates will still find admission on their merits against the candidates in UR category, Mr. Agarwal submits, they will stand altogether displaced.
8. The unreserved or general category or open pool is the only category, where selection is on merit, irrespective of any other consideration. Merit must and will find place in the unreserved category, notwithstanding the meritorious candidate belongs to a reserved category/ sub-category. From the available seats, those that are to be allotted otherwise are carved out by reservation. There is no dispute that reservation applies vertically as well as horizontally. An undesirable consequence of reservation is subjugation of merit.
9. There is a purpose for reservation. It is affirmative action providing some people with preferential treatment, enforceable by law. In the UR category there has been provided horizontal reservation for those in such category as belong to sub-category UR-NCC. Directing vertical movement of successful horizontally reserved candidates in sub-category OBC-NCC to cause displacement of candidates belonging to the higher horizontally reserved sub-category UR-NCC, will result in defeating the latter horizontal reservation. We will not direct so. Upward migration by law declared is on premise of displacing UR or general or open pool candidates.
10. Of the many cases relied upon by petitioner, our attention was also drawn to, inter alia, paragraphs 22 and 23 from judgment of the Supreme Court in V.V. Giri Vs. Dippala Suri Dora reported in AIR 1959 SC 1318, extracted and reproduced in Saurav Yadav Vs. State of Uttar Pradesh reported in AIR 2021 SC 233. Said paragraphs are reproduced below.
[From Dippala Suri Dora (supra)] "22. In this connection we may refer by way of analogy to the provisions made in some educational institutions and universities whereby in addition to the prizes and scholarships awarded on general competition amongst all the candidates, some prizes and scholarships are reserved for candidates belonging to backward communities. In such cases, though the backward candidates may try for the reserved prizes and scholarships, they are not precluded from claiming the general prizes and scholarships by competition with the rest of the candidates.
23 The High Courts of Rajasthan, Bombay, Uttarakhand, and Gujarat have adopted the same principle while dealing with horizontal reservation whereas the High Court of Allahabad and Madhya Pradesh have taken a contrary view. These two views, for facility, are referred to as the "first view" and the "second view" respectively. The second view that weighed with the High Courts of Allahabad and Madhya Pradesh is essentially based on the premise that after the first two steps as detailed in paragraph 18 of the decision in Anil Kumar Gupta and Others and after vertical reservations are provided for, at the stage of accommodating candidates for effecting horizontal reservation, the candidates from reserved categories can be adjusted only against their own categories under the concerned vertical reservation and not against the "Open or General Category"."
(emphasis supplied) On query Mr. Rai has not been able to show from Dippala Suri Dora (supra) nor Saurav Yadav (supra), adjudication and declaration on consequent displacement of selected horizontally reserved candidates, on upward migration by candidates belonging to horizontally reserved same sub-category having lower cut-off mark.
11. In Sadhana Singh Dangi Vs. Pinki Asati reported in (2022) 12 SCC 401, our attention was drawn to, inter alia, paragraph 19 (Indian Kanoon print), reproduced below. "19. The law laid down in Saurav Yadav is very clear that even while applying horizontal reservation, the merit must be given precedence and that if the candidates who belong to SCs, STs and OBCs have secured higher marks or are more meritorious, they must be considered against the seats meant for unreserved candidates. The observations made by the High Court in the instant case, in our view, do not lay down the correct law. The High Court failed to appreciate that conceptually there would be no distinction between vertical and horizontal reservations, when it comes to the basic idea that even the candidates belonging to reserved categories can as well stake a claim to seats in unreserved categories if their merit position entitles them to do so."
(emphasis supplied) It is clear, in Sadhana Singh Dangi (supra) delivered by a later Bench of same strength as the Bench in Saurav Yadav (supra), there was agreement with Saurav Yadav (supra). Further, also in Sadhana Singh Dangi (supra) the upward movement was said, as must be done in respect of candidates of a horizontally reserved sub-category moving up to occupy seats meant for unreserved candidates.
12. For reasons aforesaid, we are constrained to dismiss the writ petition as without merit.
(Arindam Sinha,J.) (Prashant Kumar,J.) August 28, 2025 Mohini