The Hindu : Private colleges to fill 70 p.c. seats by CET

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Mar 12, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka

Private colleges to fill 70 p.c. seats by CET

By Our Special Correspondent

Bangalore March 11. The Government's efforts to persuade the private unaided medical and dental college managements to give up a fair percentage of seats to it seem to have come to nought with the Karnataka Private Medical Colleges' Association unilaterally announcing its mode of admission to MBBS and BDS courses.

However, the saving grace for students and their parents concerned over the uncertainty about the CET system is that the association is agreeable to fill 70 per cent of seats on the basis of marks obtained by students in the PUC examination and the test to be conducted by a restructured Common Entrance Test Cell.

However, the parents have to brace themselves for a quantum jump in the fees.

The association, headed by the former Congress MP, Shyamanur Shivashankarappa, and consisting of a good number of Congress leaders, has announced the mode of admission in terms of "complete autonomy" given to private unaided educational institutions, including engineering and medical colleges, by the Supreme Court in its October 31, 2002 order in T.M.A.Pai Foundation and others vs. the State of Karnataka and others. An 11-judge Constitution Bench, headed by the then Chief Justice of India, B.N.Kirpal, had passed the judgment touching upon the rights of minority, non-minority, aided and unaided private managements covering the gamut of education, from the primary school level to the highest.

The association has spelt out its decision through an advertisement in a section of the Press two days ahead of the meeting of Floor Leaders of parties in the two Houses of the Legislature convened by the Government on Wednesday.

The offer to fill 70 per cent of the seats on the basis of PUC and CET marks is seen as a climb-down by the private unaided managements.

Earlier, they had offered to cede only 20 to 25 per cent of medical seats to be filled through the Common Entrance Test.

The association wants the Government to convert the CET Cell into an "independent autonomous organisation with representatives from the Government, the private institutions and eminent educationists/informatics experts from the public. If this is not done, the marks in PUC or equivalent examination will be the sole criterion for admission." It also wants the Government to engage an independent agency such as the National Informatics Centre to prepare the merit list based on the qualifying examination marks of the applicants. It says that preference be given to students from Karnataka in drawing up the merit list.

On the mode of admission, the association says that 50 per cent weightage would be given to marks obtained in the PUC or equivalent examination and 50 per cent for marks obtained in the CET (restructured).

Of the remaining 30 per cent of seats, 20 per cent will be for merit students belonging to the poor and weaker sections of society, including SC and ST and other "constitutionally provided groups from the local area" where the college is situated. The remaining 10 per cent of seats will be utilised by the managements to "subserve the objectives of establishing the college" for the children of members of staff, outstanding sportspersons, children of eminent persons who had contributed to the State/country/ society/trust and so on.

On the crucial issue of fees to be charged, the Karnataka Private Medical College Association has said that it would be "below Rs. three lakh per annum" for the medical course and Rs. two lakh a year for the dental course. The poor and weaker section students would be charged an annual fee of Rs. 60,000 for medical and Rs. 40,000 a year for dental and the "balance will be met by the managements through scholarships".

As the Supreme Court has banned the collection of donations, the association has said that "no other fee other than tuition fee will be collected directly or indirectly from any student".

However, the statutory fee to be paid to the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences will be collected.

On the basis for fixing the fees, the managements have said that in 1994, Ferguson & Co had, under the directions of the Medical Council of India and the Supreme Court, fixed Rs. 3.18 lakh a year per student as the realistic cost of imparting medical education. The Centre, in an answer to a question in the Lok Sabha furnished on February 26, said that the cost of imparting medical education was Rs. 3.15 lakh a year. The cost of education per student in government medical colleges varied from Rs. 3.4 lakh to Rs. four lakh a year.

The association represents 28 of the 32 medical colleges and 35 of the 36 dental colleges in the State.

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