Aspirants will get access to 541 colleges across country
By: PK Correspondent
Srinagar, Sep 17: Medical aspirants from Jammu and Kashmir will get access to 800 to 1000 more medical seats apart from their own quota, excluding 15 % now onwards, share from each J&K Medical College kept for students from outside.
According to the officials the J&K administration has opted for All India pool and it would help the high ranking students to get access to top colleges across the country. The J&K Government has conveyed its decision to the Union Ministry to join All India Pool. From next session J&K students are likely to get their share.
Officials said that about 800 to 1000 all India seats can be accessed through NEET exams by the J&K students from next year onwards. The All India seats were created in 1986 but J&K had opted out of it by refusing to contribute its share to all India seats. Besides NEET, the J&K students would be able to access 15000 more MBBS and BDS seats across the country.
According to the details there are about 541 Medical and Dental Colleges in India including privates and their intake quota is about 82,926 seats. Out of the total, 263 colleges are private while 278 pertain to Government in various States and UTs. Apart from this, 1899 seats alone are in AIIMS and 249 under JIPMER quota. At present, J&K has eight medical colleges offering 985 seats and next year one more is likely to be added.
According to the experts if the J&K students get opportunity to compete at national level, not only the students will have option of getting trained at higher ranked Medical Colleges like MAMC, CMC and other places/centres of excellence like Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai etc, but more medical seats will come into the kitty of J&K boys and girls.
At present, the students of J&K are confined to study in only J&K Colleges. The decision of the government to join the All India Poll will provide students with an opportunity to get medical education in colleges and places across which are ranked higher than J&K colleges.
It’s in place to mention here that in All India pool each college contributes 15% of its seats and becomes eligible to it at graduation level. By leaving around 150 seats for the students from outside, J&K aspirants would be able to get at least five times more seats from All India pool.
A retired official said, “When All India seats quota was envisaged in 1986 some top people played a pivotal role in J&K Government deciding to opt out of the pool. The top people in J&K political circles, having control over admissions and nominations, and other methodology was quiet prevalent during those days. In order to control the admission process the decision to join the pool was opposed.”