MP HC allows state nursing council to hold CET; asks CBI to speed up re-inspection of colleges

JABALPUR : The Madhya Pradesh High Court has permitted the MP Nurses Registration Council (MPNRC) to conduct Common Entrance Test (CET) for admission to nursing colleges for the 2024-25 academic session. The HC also directed the CBI to speed up reinspection of 169 nursing colleges and submit its report. The permission was granted after the MPNRC filed an application seeking certain directions from the MP High Court, including for holding CET for admission to nursing colleges.

Madhya Pradesh Advocate General Prashant Singh submitted in the court that CET was needed to keep the admission process transparent and clean. "We grant permission to MPNRC to conduct Common Entrance Test of the students before admitting them in nursing colleges," a division bench comprising Justices Sanjay Dwivedi and AK Paliwal observed on Thursday. The HC also allowed the MPNRC's request to inspect the colleges in which students are going to be given admission currently.

"The state government and others are also directed to inspect the colleges of private universities so as to discern whether they come within the ambit of suited colleges or not. And if it is found that they fulfil the requirement to be enlisted as suited colleges, then they may be permitted to grant admission to the students and those students will also be required to appear in the CET," the HC order stated. "It is made clear that if the colleges which are in the list of deficient colleges satisfy the committee constituted by this court and it is found that those colleges have removed deficiencies and can be placed in the list of suitable colleges, they can also give admission after getting green-signal from the committee," the bench further observed. The committee is required to expedite the proceedings so as to evade delay in upcoming sessions, the court added.

The HC also directed the Central Bureau of Investigation to speed up its re-inspection of 169 colleges (that were earlier declared suited) and submit its report so as to dissipate the possibility of unnecessary delay in forthcoming sessions. The court was hearing a PIL filed by the Law Students Association pointing to certain discrepancies in the nursing colleges, including not having proper infrastructure, the petitioner's counsel Vishal Baghel told PTI.

The CBI, which is probing alleged irregularities in the functioning of several colleges, many of which lack infrastructure, inspected 308 institutes across the state. It gave a clean chit to 169 colleges but, on May 30, the MP High Court asked the agency to reinspect these 169 after it came to light that two CBI officials were held for allegedly taking bribes for some institutions for favourable reports. The agency's report, which was submitted in January this year, also stated that 73 colleges lacked infrastructure and 66 were unsuited.