HC declares AIIMS certificates to be valid

New Delhi, Aug 31: The Delhi High Court today said that the MBBS degrees distributed recently by AIIMS administration would be valid despite the fact that they did not contain the requisite signatures of the institution's President and Dean.

A division bench of Chief Justice M K Sharma and Justice Veena Birbal said ''We do not know whether there is any dispute in AIIMS or not. But the students, who are innocent should not suffer because of all this.'' Putting a stamp of approval on the degrees, the court said ''we will address reservations of Health Minister and AIIMS President Anbumani Ramadoss and its Dean academics later during the hearing.'' Meanwhile, the certificates issued by the AIIMS could be used by the students, the court added.

The significant observation came during the hearing on the petition filed by some resident doctors of the premier institution who were apprehensive about the validity of the degrees as they were without the requisite signatures.

Mukta Gupta, appearing for the Dean, academics said ''the certificates were not valid and we are not going to put our signatures on them.'' The bench took strong note of her statement and said the future of innocent students should be protected.

The court, however, allowed the submissions of AIIMS President and Health Minister Ramadoss and dean academics that they would issue separate certificates to the students.

The court would hear the matter on Monday.

UNI