The final decision on conducting the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for admission to MBBS and postgraduate degrees in medicine for academic year 2013-14 is likely to be announced on Friday.
The three-day schedule for final hearing and disposal of the case at the Supreme Court will conclude on January 17, issuing the verdict on the dilemma faced by nearly 1.
5 lakh students in Andhra Pradesh.
Though the date for Eamcet- 2013 for engineering stream was announced earlier this month, the state government has not given any final notification regarding Eamcet for MBBS.
Around 76 private medical colleges and other bodies had petitioned against the decision to conduct a nationalized entrance examination initially, pegging the total number to 115.
The state government had previously written to the Medical Council of India (MCI) citing necessitating changes in law, drawback of the existing syllabus and language barrier for rural students as reasons to stay the examination for a period of one year.
On large number vacant seats in technical colleges, the court wanted to know how the unfilled seats in medical colleges can be filled in case of entrance tests conducted by the state are applicable only to domiciles and asked whether candidates who failed to make it to the cut-off would be given admissions to fill up the vacancies.
“The SC has divided the discussion into four salient features which include the right vested with the MCI to conduct a medical entrance examination, the rights of minority institutions to conduct their own entrance tests, the impact on the autonomy of the states to regulate the admission process in medical colleges and the fundamental right of a candidate.
The court had been hearing the petitioners’ views on each point and the discussion seems to be progressing in the right direction,” said Dr.G. Bhaskara Rao, chairman of All India Un-Aided Medical Colleges and Universities Association.
The private medical colleges in the state have however declared that they will go ahead with a separate entrance examination for admission to PG as well as for UG courses in medicine.
The chief petitioner, Christian Medical College, Vellore, and other private linguistic and religious minority institutions were given the permission earlier to go ahead with individual entrance examinations for admission to the courses, though the NEET persists.