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Friday March 29, 2024

Revolution and rule of merit in medical education steps away now

By Ahmad Noorani
November 15, 2016

Islamabad

Any student taking admission by paying extra money (bribe) to a private medical college to bypass the merit order of applicants in that college in a specific year will be struck off by the Pakistani Medical & Dental Council (PM&DC) and will not be registered by the counsel.

Students getting admission in private medical colleges on seats reserved for foreigners/Overseas Pakistanis without having studied the latest degree outside Pakistan will also have to face the same fate during the very first year of their MBBS degree. 

The developments will bring an end to the long regime of unfair, unjust and corrupt practices in the medical sector of the country and are being considered historic by all means. The last ten years of rule of corruption and favouritism in sector of medical education has played havoc with the standards of medical profession as a whole.

“All private medical colleges will have to display their merit lists with all details on their websites and any students unjustly rejected by any medical college can immediately inform PM&DC along with evidences” Dr Amir Bandesha member of PM&DC Executive Committee told The News while explaining new policy and added, “If proved that any complainant student should have fallen in the merit list because of his marks, his grievances will be address by admitting him in the college, striking off the names of wrongly admitted students in that college and an action will be initiated against wrongly admitted students and the said college.” 

Bandesha said that the maximum annual fee for the local as well as foreigner or overseas students has been fixed by the council and is same for all the medical and dental colleges.

Under the new approved policy, the principals of all the universities will have to submit the verified documents of all students applied and admitted in any of university’s constituent or affiliated medical or dental college by March 31, 2017 especially the documents verifying two years stay and study abroad of the students who get admitted on seats reserved foreigner or overseas students.

Under the new policy, all students intending to get admission in any medical or dental college affiliated with any university were supposed to undertake a centralized test conducted by the federal or provincial authorities. 

After repeated and overwhelming complaints of parents and students about massive violation of merit while finalization of merit lists in private medical colleges and demand of huge amounts of underhand money by many such colleges, under the new policy, private medical colleges are not allowed to prepare merit lists at their own. 

Only universities can prepare the merit in all of their constituent and affiliated colleges and final merit lists have to be displayed on websites of the universities as well as the medical colleges. PMDC will note down the names, evaluate the merit process and will entertain the complaints of the rejected students. 

The PM&DC will register only those students who will come on merit and all other will be rejected even if they will succeed to continue their education on the force of their money.

Experts say transparency will help the students not coming on merit list to ascertain their actual position and in case of any wrongdoing they will knock the door of PM&DC and will receive instant justice.

On Saturday, Justice Shams Mehmood Mirza of Lahore High Court (LHC) stayed a policy notification issued on October 27, 2016. 

According to details, University of Health Sciences (UHS) Lahore recommends ‘MCAT’, which is a comprehensive test for admission to medical colleges in Punjab either affiliated with it with any private university in the province. 

Undertaking this test is a must but afterwards the universities make merit lists of their constituent and affiliated medical colleges at their own. UHS started accepting application for admission in its 30 medical and dental colleges from November 7, 2016 and till November 12, 2016, a total of 4884 students applied for admission in these colleges. However, another university, National University of Medical Sciences (NUMS), which is a project of Pakistan Army, recommended taking its own test or a test known as SAT II. 

This was because the federal government’s policy was announced late, while NUMS had already initiated its process. As UHS has to accept only comprehensive MCAT test, a student which had applied in NUMS and had taken only SAT II and avoided taking MCAT, moved LHC on the grounds that she would be unable to apply in private medical colleges in Punjab because of strict condition of MCAT. 

In fact, she should have taken comprehensive MCAT if she was interested in applying in Punjab colleges instead of challenging whole system. However, she was granted relief as well as an important notification was also set aside resulting in confusion among students about the future process or policy regarding admissions. 

The PM&DC is moving an appeal against the order on Monday (today) to inform the superior court about the impact of setting aside October 27 notification and the past corrupt practices in sector of medical education.