The announcement of the seat matrix for undergraduate medical courses is likely to be further delayed due to the delay in finding an amicable solution to the fee structure of government quota seats in private medical colleges in the State.
When contacted, Medical Education Minister Sharanprakash Patil told The Hindu on Monday that the announcement of the seat matrix for medical seats available under the government and private medical colleges quota is likely to be delayed and the allotment of the medical seats to the students would also be delayed.
As per the schedule, the seat matrix for the medical and engineering courses should have been announced on Tuesday at 4 p.m. and the option entry for students aspiring to enter medical and engineering courses was slated from June 15 to 22, and the mock allotment of the seats was slated to be held on June 23 at 4 p.m. Option to change the colleges was slated from June 23 to 25 and publication of real allotment of the seats was scheduled on June 26 at 4 p.m. The confirmation of the choices, payment of fees and downloading of admission card was scheduled from July 27 to 29. The last date for the students to report to the college was June 30.
With the likely delay in the announcement of the seat matrix for the medical courses, now the process of admission which is scheduled to begin from June 15 would be limited to Engineering eourses. The admission process for medical seats would begin at a later date after finalising the fee structure for the government quota seats in private medical colleges.
Dr. Patil said that the government held more than two rounds of talks with the representatives of the managements of private colleges but could not arrive at an agreement on the fee structure. The private managements were not favourable to the differential fee structure for the government quota and the seats which would be filled through NEET merit list and wanted an uniform fee structure.
He said the government’s stand was that the previous practice of subsidised fee structure for the government quota seats in private medical colleges should continue this year also. The managements of the private medical colleges have made it clear that they would not abrogate the consensual agreement of sharing of the seats in the private medical colleges with the government and the only dispute now was the fee structure. “Ï am confident that this dispute would be resolved amicably keeping the interests of the students in mind and the process of admission to the medical courses starts at the earliest”.
