NEET counselling: Manipur High Court allows student to switch from State to management quota after cybercafé error

The petitioner appeared in NEET-UG 2026 for admission to the MBBS course and secured 325/720 marks, with an All India Rank of 500285 and an OBC-NCL category rank of 225374.

The Directorate of Medical Education, Manipur issued a notification dated 10 August 2026 providing for counselling for Government, Management and NRI seats, including Management-quota MBBS seats at Shija Academy of Health Sciences (“SAHS”).

Although the petitioner allegedly selected the SAHS Management quota in the form supplied by the cybercafé, the online application was uploaded showing the Government/State quota, with seat preferences for SAHS, CMC, JNIMS and RIMS.

She submitted a representation on 18 August 2026 seeking correction of the category from Government seat to Management seat; the Directorate forwarded the request with an observation that she was eligible for the Management quota.

The request was rejected on 21 August 2026 on the ground that the counselling guidelines did not permit alteration of the locked seat category.

The petitioner consequently filed the writ petition and an interim application seeking permission to participate in the third round of counselling for the SAHS Management quota.

1. Whether a candidate participating in NEET-UG counselling may choose a different seat category in a subsequent counselling round from the category selected in an earlier round, particularly where the subsequent-round choice is governed by the counselling SOP.

2. Whether the petitioner should be permitted, pending adjudication of the writ petition, to participate in the third round of counselling for an SAHS Management-quota seat despite the earlier online application reflecting the Government quota.

3. Whether the writ petition was maintainable where the petitioner challenged her exclusion from the third counselling round on account of an alleged error in the online registration.

The Court applied Article 226 of the Constitution, including the power of a Constitutional Court to grant interim relief and mould relief to prevent an otherwise futile success in the main proceeding.

It interpreted the Manipur Medical e-Counselling Notification dated 10 August 2026 and the appended SOP: paragraph A.4 provides that seat-category choices, once finally submitted for a particular counselling process, are locked and cannot be modified, whereas paragraph A.14 requires fresh choice-filling in every counselling round and provides that a choice made in one round is not valid for subsequent rounds.

The Court also relied on Preety Soibam v. State of Manipur & Ors., where “SAHS” in the State counselling record was held to include both the State and Management quotas, and noted that the order had attained finality.

The State’s reliance on Arvind Kumar Kankane v. State of U.P., Priya Gupta v. State of Chhattisgarh, Jammu & Kashmir Public Service Commission v. Israr Ahmad, Rajasthan High Court, Jodhpur v. Neetu Harsh and Divya v. Union of India was considered in the context of finality of choices, adherence to merit and counselling schedules, and the general bar against changing categories midway.

However, the Court held that the SOP was an administrative instruction rather than a statutory provision and that no national counselling guideline imposed the asserted absolute prohibition on alteration of seat choice in a subsequent round.

The Court distinguished between altering a locked choice within the same counselling round and making a fresh choice for a subsequent round.

Paragraph A.4 prohibited modification of a choice after final submission for that round, but paragraph A.14 expressly required candidates to fill in and lock a new choice in every subsequent round; therefore, the State could not rely on paragraph A.4 to bar the petitioner from making a fresh Management-quota choice for the third round.

The Court further found that the State’s own preference acknowledgement slip recorded “SAHS” without expressly qualifying it as either State or Management quota, consistent with the reasoning in Preety Soibam that “SAHS” could encompass both categories.

The petitioner had raised the alleged error before the registration period closed, was admittedly eligible for the Management quota, was willing to pay the additional fee, and sought no relaxation of merit or counselling norms.

Since denial of interim participation could render any eventual success in the writ petition meaningless, the balance of convenience and the need to protect the petitioner’s opportunity for MBBS admission justified interim intervention under Article 226.

It allowed MC(WP(C) No. 749 of 2026 and directed the State respondents to permit the petitioner to participate in the ongoing third round of counselling for an SAHS Management-quota seat.

If the third round had already concluded, the respondents were directed to conduct a special third round for the petitioner.

The Court rejected the preliminary objection to maintainability, listed the main writ petition for 28 September 2026, and permitted the parties to complete their pleadings in the meantime.