The Centralised Admission Committee (CENTAC) students and parents associations have called upon the government to seek special permission from Central regulatory authorities to extend the counselling schedule to fill the substantial number of MBBS and engineering seats that lie vacant.
Representatives of the CENTAC Students Parents Association, All CENTAC Students Parents Association and Pre-Medical Students Association claim that out of the 1,350 MBBS and BDS seats in Union Territory of Pondicherry, 117 MBBS and BDS seats are vacant. Moreover, over 100 seats are vacant at Pondicherry Engineering College, Puducherry and Perunthalaivar Kamarajar Institute of Engineering and Technology, Karaikal - both Government Engineering Colleges of Government of Puducherry. Apart from these government colleges, many seats are vacant at private engineering colleges, the Associations said.
According to a spokesman for the CENTAC Students Parents Association, since huge number of MBBS, BDS and para-medical and biology stream courses, pharma course seats are unusually vacant, this academic year, the government needs to obtain special permission by approaching the MCI or AICTE to fill all the CENTAC vacant seats.
“Another option would be for government to get a court order to fill these huge number of vacant seats to the protect the educational rights of the students community of the Union Territory of Puducherry,” he said.
Activists say that the argument of CENTAC officials about passed deadlines such as the August 15 set by AICTE for engineering admission or September 30 fixed by the MCI for medical admissions, was not a hard-and-fast norm, as several times in the past, the deadlines have been relaxed on request by States. For instance, AIIMS, Patna, is conducting a special counselling on October 17, 2016 to fill all the vacant MBBS seats. Likewise many institutions and colleges across the country are conducting special and spot counselling across various States throughout the country.
The associations have sought the Puducherry government to request Central regulatory authorities to allow an extension of counselling to fill vacant seats for the benefit of the student community.
