The Supreme Court, on February 12, upheld a civil appeal contesting the appointment of Dr. Anil Khurana as the chairperson of the National Commission for Homeopathy.

A bench comprising Justices Dipankar Datta and Manmohan ruled that the appointment was not legally valid and instructed Dr. Khurana to vacate the position within one week.

"The Respondent shall stepdown from the office of Chairperson forthwith. By forthwith, we mean a week from today to enable him to complete his assignment however without taking any policy decision involved with finances. Fresh process shall be initiated for appointment of the office of chairperson expeditiously. Benefits received by the 3rd Respondent are not touched. However, fruit of benefit shall go to him on the basis of service rendered him as chairperson."

According to the brief facts, the petitioner filed a writ petition before the Karnataka High Court challenging the appointments of Dr. Anil Khurana as the chairperson of the National Commission for Homeopathy and Dr. K.R. Janardanan Nair as the President of the Medical Assessment and Rating Board of the Commission.

The petitioner, an applicant for both positions, challenged the appointments on the grounds that the two respondents lacked the requisite experience mandated under Section 4(2) and Section 19 of the National Commission for Homeopathy Act, 2020, respectively.

Section 4(2) defines the qualification of Chairman and read as: "The Chairperson shall be a person of outstanding ability, proven administrative capacity and integrity, possessing a postgraduate degree in Homeopathy from a recognized University and having experience of not less than twenty years in the field of Homeopathy, out of which at least ten years shall be as a leader in the area of healthcare delivery, growth and development of Homeopathy or is education."

For the purpose of this section, the term "leader" refers to the Head of a Department or the Head of an Organisation. Justice N.S. Sanjay Gowda of the High Court upheld Dr. K.R. Janardanan Nair's appointment, but allowed the challenge to Dr. Anil Khurana's appointment, citing a lack of the required years of experience.

It said: "Thus, in order to be the Chairperson of the National Commission for Homeopathy, a person should have 20 years' experience in the field of Homeopathy and out of these 20 years, he should have been a Head of the Department or the Head of an Organisation in the area of Healthcare delivery, growth and development of Homeopathy or its education...

However, this was then set aside by a division bench of Justices N.V. Anjaria and K.V. Aravind of the Karnataka High Court dated August 31, 2022.