KARACHI, Oct 27: A religious minority student on Thursday moved the Sindh High Court against the condition of studying Islamiat at O level to get an equivalence certificate from the local education board to appear in the forthcoming entrance test for MBBS admissions in medical colleges and institutions.

Petitioner Sagar Ladhani, represented by Advocate Dr Mohammad Farogh Naseem, belonging to the Hindu community, completed his O and A levels from the University of Cambridge through a local private schooling system.

He stated that the subjects of religious studies, prescribed in the O level syllabus, were Islamic Religious Culture and Islamiat for Muslim students and Religious Studies and Bible for Christian students.

The petitioner stated that there was no subject in the O level curriculum for the students belonging to other religious minorities, including the Hindus.

He submitted that when he approached the Board of Intermediate Education to obtain an equivalence certificate of A level, he was told that it could be granted to him only if he had passed Religious Studies at O level or Ethics at the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) exams.

He said he was unable to apply to the Dow University of Health Sciences for appearing in the forthcoming entrance test for MBBS admission, as the education board declined to grant him the equivalence certificate as required by the university.

The petitioner's counsel stated that the placement test for admission to medical colleges would be conducted on Oct 30 and the petitioner was informed on Oct 4 that he should have taken Ethics or Religious Studies along with other mandatory subjects at O level for obtaining SSC equivalent certificate from the education board.

He stated that such a condition was not notified to the petitioner prior to his taking O level exams. Also, he said, Ethics was not part of the curriculum in the Cambridge education system but part of the curriculum in the SSC exams.

The counsel stated that the SSC examination of Ethics was scheduled for May 2012 and if the condition was not relaxed, the petitioner was bound to lose his academic year. He prayed to the court that the petitioner, subject to qualification or otherwise, be allowed to take the scheduled admission test.

Mr Ladhani stated that he had passed eight subjects at O level and Ethics would be ninth in case he was required to pass it in the SCC examination, which would be unfair since other students competing in the test had passed only eight subjects.

The petitioner prayed to the court to direct the respondents to allow him to apply for admission to the medical college and sit the entrance exam.