VIJAYAWADA: The Health department has decided to take tough action against the students who are blocking PG medical seats in various colleges across the State.
Candidates who opt for a PG medical seat in a college should mandatorily join the college before the final phase of counselling, failing which they would not be permitted to exercise options in the last phase of counselling and opt for a better college/seat.
If a candidate exercised options and was allotted a seat, he cannot leave the seat. If the candidate leave, he would be debarred for three years from taking admissions in any medical college of the State.
Similarly if a candidate leaves the seat after the completion of the admission procedure, he would be fined `3 lakh and debarred for three years from taking admissions in any medical college in AP. The State government took a decision in this regard as majority of the candidates are blocking the seats by taking up the counselling in both AP and Telangana and not joining in either of the places until last minute, thus increasing the number of vacant seats in many colleges.
As per the guideline of the Medical Council of India (MCI), PG medical counselling would take place as per the schedule of the MCI.
Officials stated that in recent times, many students are applying for both AP and Telangana examinations and attending counselling sessions in both the states. This is leading to confusion among the students whether to take up the seat in AP or Telangana, thus increasing the number of vacant seats in both the regions.
“In order to curb this practice, we have called for the amendment of admission rules for Postgraduate Medical courses-1997,” a senior official of Health Department said on condition of anonymity.
Similarly, the Health department has proposed to add the unfilled service seats to the category of non-service seats after the completion of final counselling. All the female candidates will be considered for the unfilled female seats and all the unfilled female seats would be converted to the general category.
The order of priority goes by ST-SC-BC(A)-BC(B)-BC(C)-BC(D)-BC(E)-OC. All the unfilled seats of SC and BC would be converted into general category with the preference to OC.