Pune: Even if there are thousands of various fields open to make a career in, the medical field still attracts the most attention. And this has once again proved that five to six aspiring medical students vying for a single seat in health science admissions.
According to the provisional merit list of health sciences published by the Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER), there are as many as 59,597 aspirants for MBBS, BDS, BAMS, BHS etc as against 11,000 seats in govt and medical and deemed university medical colleges in the State.
Moreover, out of the total 11,000 seats, 7,000 seats are for MBBS and BDS while rest 4,000 seats are distributed in other health science faculties like Ayurveda, Homoeopathy, Physiotherapy etc., in the State, informed Director of DMER, Pravin Shingare. “In 7,000 seats of MBBS and BDS, only 4,000 seats are under State quota and 3,000 seats are under All India quota category managed by the Central government. Also, this year the overall intake capacity has been increased by 180 seats,” said Shingare.
However, he disagreed that the huge difference between the number of seats and applicants will up the competition and stated this has been the scenario each year. “Those who are unable to get admission in MBBS and BDS opt for other faculties in health science. So there is no crisis as such,” added Shingare.
Eligibility criteria
Earlier, DMER had set eligibility criteria for the State quota as students should have Maharashtra domicile and completed their SSC and HSC from Maharashtra.
However, the Mumbai High Court (HC) directed DMER to relax the eligibility criteria, stating that those students who have completed their SSC from outside Maharashtra but have done HSC from Maharashtra can be eligible under the State quota category.
The Nagpur bench of Mumbai HC in an interim order on June 11, directed that ‘the candidates who have passed SSC or equivalent exam from an institution situated outside the State provided he/she has passed HSC or qualifying exam from an institution in Maharashtra and also possess domicile certificate of Maharashtra.’
Caste validity certificate
DMER has relaxed the mandatory submission of caste validity certificate during form filling. As Aurangabad bench of Mumbai HC has directed that according to the Constitutional Reservation of Caste Certificate and the Caste/Tribe Validity Certificate, no document is required to claim the reservation in the online application form. The document is required only at the time of verification. If a candidate claiming reservation in online application form does not produce the document, then he/ she will be automatically considered in open category if otherwise eligible.
Therefore in view of Mumbai HC decision, DMER has stated, the candidates from the constitutional reserve category who do not have caste validity certificate but have proof that such a candidate has applied for caste validity certificate will be considered in the respective category at the time of document verification process.
Further, all such candidates will have to approach the respective caste scrutiny committee and obtain the caste validity certificate.
Those who obtain caste validity certificate till July 2, should produce it at any one of the eight document verification centres mentioned from July 2 to 3 between 10 am and 5 pm. These candidates will be granted their category claim at the time of selection. While those who among these candidates fail to produce caste validity certificate by July 3 before 5 pm will be considered under the ‘General’ category, if otherwise eligible.
The first selection list that is scheduled to be declared on July 2 will be published on July 4 after 8 pm.
