VIJAYAWADA: With the Medical Council of India (MCI) restraining six medical colleges in the State from going ahead with the admission process for MBBS courses as they have failed to meet the necessary requirements, the number of seats is poised to witness a steep fall in the 2018-19 academic year. Besides, MCI has refused to grant permission for new medical colleges.
SVS Institute of Medical Science, Chittoor, Nimra Institute of Medical Sciences, Ibrahimpatnam, Gayatri Vidya Parishad Institute of Healthcare and Medical Technology, Visakhapatnam went ahead with admissions in the last phases of counselling as the MCI issued an order barring admissions to these colleges for the academic years 2017-18 and 2018-19. On the directions of the Supreme Court, these colleges continued with admissions in the year 2017-18.
This year, along with these three colleges, three others including Viswabharathi Medical College, Kurnool, Konaseema Institute of Medical Sciences (KIMS) and GSL Medical College, Rajamahendravaram were also barred from initiating the admission process for the first time. Right after the announcement of the NEET UG results, the MCI issued an advisory to be followed at the time of admissions in medical colleges.
However, officials of Dr NTR University of Health Sciences (NTRUHS) say that the colleges still have time until June 30 to convince MCI and make sure that they meet the MCI requirements.
Speaking to Express, S Appala Naidu, Registrar of NTRUHS, said, “The colleges which do not have proper teaching facilities or infrastructure, have been debarred from taking up the process of admissions. But, they have time until June 30.”
From this year, the AP has joined the national pool quota which means that the candidates belonging to the State, who secure ranks below 10,000 in All India category, will have good chances of securing seats in other colleges. In AP, 1,750 seats are available in government medical colleges and 261 will go the national quota. In private colleges, there are 2,250 seats out of which 1,177 are in convener quota, 730 in B category and 342 in NRI quota.
The Gitam College, with 150 seats, has no convenor quota. All the six colleges, which were served notices, have 850 seats. Of them, 350 seats are in the convenor quota. In 2017, a total number of 32,392 candidates from Andhra Pradesh have qualified NEET and in 2018, a total number of 35,732 candidates from AP qualified the test.