In a move which followed the harshened stance on NEET by the Medical Council of India (or MCI), the government council has since cancelled the admissions of over 519 students who were pursuing their MBBS studies in the country. These were students who belonged to 17 colleges which had been pulled up for non-conformance earlier in the year. These students have in fact been taking part and attending classes conducted in their colleges for the past 3 months. The MCI stated that their reasons behind the cancellation of these students’ admissions were linked to the fact that the colleges had admitted the same students directly which was a violation of the Supreme Court’s order on the 28th of September, 2016. This has come as a shock the medical education fraternity in the country, as none had expected such a harsh reprimand on the part of the MCI.
Why it is being done
The MCI has instructed state governments to hold centralised counselling for students where they would then allot the admissions to various colleges based solely on the performance of students in the NEET, or National Eligibility cum Entrance Test. It was revealed by a senior official of the MCI that about 17 colleges in various states have in fact given admission directly to more than 500 students. This is in clear violation of the aforementioned order by the supreme court which strictly prohibits such admission procedure. The state of Uttar Pradesh leads the number of violating admissions, with over 480 students being fraudulently awarded admissions without the correct procedures being followed. This had been done by 14 colleges in the state who are directly responsible for this act. The remaining non-conformities are from the states of Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh and Karata from where one college each were responsible in contributing to the remaining 38 false admissions.
The MCI, or Medical Council of India, is a governmental statutory body whose responsibilities include primarily the establishment and maintenance of globally acceptable high standards and best practises in the sector of medical education as well as the recognition of medical related qualifications in the country. The registration of practising doctors in India is completely handled by the MCI and as such it is a highly invaluable and powerful body. They are also tasked with the protection and promotion of health and safety of the general public of India and they do so by effectively ensuring that proper standards are adhered to in the practice of the medical sciences.
The follies made by these accused and punished medical colleges have been heavily defended by them. They have talked about how the procedure specified which includes the general counselling is indeed very slow and painstaking and it makes the task of filling up the admission seats almost impossible by the deadline, which was the 7th of October 2016. It is in fear of this that they chose to award admissions directly rather than have vacant seats in the college which would lead to a host of other problems. Meanwhile, the students who have been displaced are feeling the real brunt of this political issue as they are left holding the ball, and wondering what will become of their futures.