Supreme Court - Daily Orders
Balachandran K.R. vs Employees State Insurance Corporation on 10 July, 2017
Bench: Arun Mishra, Amitava Roy
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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CIVIL APPEAL No(s). OF 2017
(Arising out of SLP(C) No. 31165 of 2016)
BALACHANDRAN K.R. & ANR. Appellant(s)
VERSUS
EMPLOYEES STATE INSURANCE CORPORATION
& ORS. Respondent(s)
O R D E R
Heard learned counsel for the parties. Leave granted.
Being unsuccessful, before the High Court in challenging the denial of accommodation of the appellant No.2 against the quota of seats under “Ward of Insured Person' for admission to the MBBS course in the medical college administered by the respondent-Corporation, the appellants seek the remedial intervention of this court. Signature Not Verified Digitally signed by NEELAM GULATI Date: 2017.07.25
The appellant No.1 is a watchman of the 10:25:21 IST Reason: establishment covered under the Employees State Insurance Act, 1948 (in short 'the Act') and the 2 appellant No.2 is his daughter. She has qualified in the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET 2016) and is thus eligible for admission to the MBBS Course. The respondent-Corporation has offered a management quota to the said course under nomenclature 'Ward of Insured Person' which has been set out in Clause 8 of the prospectus/admission notice and also reiterated in Clause 3 of the pre-admission notice relatable to the admission process in the MBBS Course for the academic session 2016-2017. As per the said provision, for the ward to be qualified to be accommodated against the said quota, the insured person has to be an employee as defined in the Act and should have been in the insured employment for a minimum period of five years as on 1st January of the year of admission and should have paid at least 78 days' contribution in each contribution period. The relevant extract of the Clause pertaining to “Insured Person” is quoted herein:
“Insured person for the purpose of availing benefit of insured Persons (IPS) Quota of availing benefit of insured Persons (IPS) Quota (erstwhile ESIC Management Quota) for his/her wards shall be, 3 as under
“The 'insured person' shall be an 'employee' as defined in the ESI Act; and he/she should have been in continuous insurable employment for a minimum period of five years as on 1st January of the year of admission and should have paid at least 78 days of contributing in each contribution period, during this five year period. The 5 year period should be counted from the date of entry into the ESI Scheme...” Admittedly the appellant no. 1 is in continuous insurable employment as contemplated for more than five years, but there is a shortage of one day's contribution during the relevant period i.e. 01.04.2013 to 30.9.2013. Thus because of this shortage of contribution by one day, the appellant no.2 has been disqualified and has been denied accommodation against the aforementioned management quota. Consequently, because of such shortfall, the Ward of Insured Persons Certificate has not been issued to the appellant no.2 and she was thus not included in the list of eligible candidates for admission against the Ward of Insured Persons quota.
To reiterate, the appellants approached the High Court seeking its intervention, but having been denied the same, are before this Court. 4
This Court issued notice on 28.10.2016 and in the interim had directed that the appellant no.2 should be permitted to attend the classes as she had already been admitted. Subsequent thereto, by order dated 06.3.2017 the appellant no.2 was permitted to appear in the internal assessment but the results were directed not to be declared before the final decision in the instant appeal.
After hearing the learned counsel for the parties and on a consideration of the attendant facts and circumstances, we are of the view that without creating a precedent, the appellant No.2 ought to be allowed to continue and complete her course which she is pursuing as on date. Not only the default is very minimal, the appellant no.2 meanwhile has been admitted to the course and a substantial period has elapsed in between. Albeit, we would observe that the High Court was on principle, not unjustified in declining to relax the rigor of the guidelines, in the singular facts and circumstances as narrated hereinabove, we feel that it would serve the cause of justice, by balancing the equities, that appellant no.2 be not dislodged 5 from the course of study, at this point of time. She would thus be treated as a regularly admitted student for all subjects and purposes We however, reiterate that this order has been passed in the facts and circumstances of the present case and would neither serve nor would be cited as a precedent in future.
The appeal is allowed.
................J. (ARUN MISHRA) ................J. (AMITAVA ROY) NEW DELHI;
JULY 10, 2017
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ITEM NO.8 COURT NO.11 SECTION XI -A
S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A
RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS
Petition(s) for Special Leave to Appeal (C) No(s). 31165/2016 (Arising out of impugned final judgment and order dated 07-10-2016 in WA No. 1992/2016 passed by the High Court Of Kerala At Ernakulam) BALACHANDRAN K.R. & ANR. Petitioner(s) VERSUS EMPLOYEES STATE INSURANCE CORPORATION & ORS. Respondent(s) Date : 10-07-2017 This petition was called on for hearing today. CORAM :
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ARUN MISHRA HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE AMITAVA ROY For Petitioner(s) Mr. M. P. Vinod, AOR Mr. Dileep Pillai, Adv.
Mr. Ajay K. Jain, Adv.
Mr. Atul Shankar Vinod, Adv.
For Respondent(s) Ms. Nimit Mathur, Adv.
Ms. Yakesh Anand, Adv.
Mr. Sanjeev Anand, AOR Mr. V. N. Raghupathy, AOR Mr. Gaurav Sharma, AOR Ms. Amandeep Kaur, Adv.
Mr. Prateek Bhatia, Adv. Mr. Dhawal Mohan, Adv.
Ms. Vora Gaur, Adv.
UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following O R D E R Leave granted.
The appeal is allowed in terms of the signed order.
(NEELAM GULATI) (TAPAN KUMAR CHAKRABORTY) COURT MASTER (SH) BRANCH OFFICER (SIGNED ORDER IS PLACED ON THE FILE)