Andhra Pradesh: Private medical colleges lose 350 MBBS seats

Andhra Pradesh: Due to failure of its compliance with MCI norms, private medical colleges in the state will not be able to offer 350 MBBS seats this academic year. These colleges have fallen short on faculty and infrastructure will likely to get the cancelled seats back. This may happen after July 15.

SC has directed the council to allow them more time till July 15 to rectify their deficiencies. During this course of time they can improve on the facilities and work on faculty appointment.

Official sources have confirmed that MCI will consider restoring the seats after their inspection team completes the mandatory round after July 15.

This share of seats is likely to increase the number of seats offered under Neet-2. While it is clear that admissions under category A and B in the state will be admitted through Eamcet and Neet respectively now. Recently, AP Private Medical Colleges Managements Associations had spoken about an existing ambiguity in private common entrance tests (CETs) after the NEET ordinance. It has said that while the stand of the state common medical admissions test is now clear, we can till now only interpret that the same applies to entrance test conducted by private institutions as well. It may be recalled that the Supreme Court in its earlier order has made the private medical admission tests void.

A senior official of Dr. NTR University of Health Sciences told The Hindu that the MCI had refused to approve renewal of the given number of seats following the inability of the college managements to have proper facilities and qualified faculty.

It is only at the behest of the Supreme Court now that the private colleges have been granted additional time for compliance with the MCI norms. If approved, the state will get additional 350 MBBS seats.

However, there is good news for the state medical aspirants after Andhra Medical College has received approval from the health ministry to offer 200 medical seats for this academic year. It will now offer an addition of 50 MBBS seats for the fifth time, during the 2016-17 academic session also. This news has been further confirmed by the Principal S.V. Kumar.