Mumbai Admissions to most medical, dental and paramedical courses ended recently and as per information shared by the state common entrance test (CET) cell, seats have been vacant across courses, except undergraduate medical (MBBS).
Of the 6,719 seats available in MBBS colleges (both government and private), only one seat is vacant this year. However, in undergraduate dental (BDS) courses, seat vacancy stands at 87. Similarly, seat vacancy in PG medical and dental stands at 196 and 35, respectively. Admissions to paramedical courses, including ayurveda, homoeopathy and physiotherapy ended on Friday.
“We conducted extra seat allotment rounds to give more chances to eligible students to apply for the paramedical courses. But now, we’ll have to adhere to the deadline and accordingly stop admissions,” said an official from the CET cell. By Friday evening, nearly 26% seats in UG physiotherapy remained unclaimed, added the official.
Many blamed the delay in admissions, as well as change in seat allotment rules, for the high number of vacancies across UG dental and PG medical courses this year. As per rule, all-India quota (AIQ) and state admission rounds used to be conducted simultaneously because vacant seats in AIQ post the second round were surrendered to respective states for state quota rounds.
However, in December 2021, the medical counselling committee (MCC) released a notification stating that 2021-22 academic year onwards, four AIQ rounds will be conducted by MCC itself–AIQ 1, AIQ 2, mop-up round 1 and stray vacancy round. No seats will be surrendered to state admission bodies, said MCC.
“The fact that seats in clinical as well as non-clinical courses across the country have gone vacant this year is an alarming trend. Authorities, both in state and central government, need to look into this and fix the problem at the earliest,” said Muzaffar Khan, a medical education activist based out of Thane.
AIQ rounds are conducted to fill up 15% seats in government and private UG medical institutes and 50% seats in government and private PG medical institutes.
