Violation of Reservation Rules: Counselling for PG medical seats Rescheduled

Patna: The Bihar Government has conceded to having flouted reservation rules in filling up of post graduate medical seats. The state government has decided to scrap the entire ongoing counselling process and re convene a fresh counselling process. An announcement to this effect has been made by the Principal Secretary, Health, R.K. Mahajan. He announced commencement of fresh counselling on May 28 and 29, in order to complete the admission process by May 31; the deadline set by the Supreme Court for PG admissions.

The 449 PG seats being offered for admissions in six Government run medical colleges, will now be re convened for counselling under the supervision of the Bihar Combined Entrance Competitive Examination Board (BCECEB). 850 students will be competing for these seats. Of these 449 seats, 350 are degree seats and 99 Diploma, said Mr. Mahajan. He also informed that these seats included the 136 degree and 32 diploma seats, which had been vacated under the central government quota and diverted to the state.

These seats will be available at : Anugraha Narayan Magadh Medical College Hospital (Gaya), Jawaharal Nehru Medical College, Sri Krishna Medical College Hospital (Muzaffarpur), Patna Medical College Hospital, Nalanda Medical College Hospital (both in Patna), Darbhanga Medical College Hospital (Darbhanga).

When asked whether action would be taken against officials responsible for the lapse in the admission process, he said, “We will initiate an inquiry before taking any action.” On the issue of a scam surfacing in the lapse, Mr.Mahajan negated it by saying, “The problem arose because of wrong interpretation of rules. There is no scam as such.”

The Principal Secretary, indicated that the procedure of combined counselling would be followed for medical aspirants this time, as against the earlier practice of conducting separate counselling for general and reserved category students.

He elaborated saying that reserved category students would be given a chance of exercising their choice of opting for merit or reserved seat only once. “Having exercised their choice once, students of the reserved category will not be able to change it,” he clarified to the HT

Earlier, reserved category students who qualified on merit used to take up general seats, however, they reverted to the reserved category for counselling in order to exercise their choice of college. Once having got an institution of choice, they used to vacate their general category seat, which would then get filled by a candidate from the reserved category. Thus decreasing the number of seats available to the general category.

It was this flaw in the admission procedure that the medicos were raising their voices against when caned during counselling in front of the BCECEB office, here last Tuesday.

The Principal Secretary, assured that the admission fee would be transferred by government authorities, incase there was any change of college during the course of fresh counselling.

Additional Secretary, Health, Pradeep Kumar Jha, was also present during this media interaction.