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A section of postgraduate dentistry aspirants is upset over various alleged anomalies in the allotment process to dental colleges in the State.
They claim to have been denied the benefits of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) decision to lower the qualifying marks and percentile for admission to Master of Dental Surgery (MDS) seats. The cut-off scores were apparently lowered in order to fill seats that remained vacant in dental colleges.
Consequently, the National Board of Examinations revised the qualifying percentiles to 24.286 (from 50th percentile for General category), 14.286 (from 40th percentile for SC, ST, OBC (including persons with disabilities of such sections), and 19.286 (from 45th percentile for Persons with disabilities). The cut-off scores were also lowered to 174, 138 and 157 respectively (from 263, 227 and 245 respectively).
The development prompted many States including Kerala that have already completed the first round of counselling to invite fresh applications for the subsequent rounds. In addition to enabling more students to seek admissions, States such as Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Karnataka have also provided opportunity for the existing candidates to register fresh options in accordance with the vacancies that existed in colleges following the first round of counselling.
However, many aspirants in Kerala have cried foul over the denial of similar opportunities in the second round of counselling. The office of the Commissioner for Entrance Examinations (CEE) has decided to entertain applications from candidates who qualified by way of the revised criteria as well as permit fresh options from existing ones only during the mop-up allotment.
The candidates point out the absence of a mock allotment round for MDS admissions leaves them with little knowledge on the changing course preferences. The lack of a centralised system to inform students on seat vacancies in colleges after the initial rounds of counselling has also been flagged.
Official sources maintain the decision not to consider the revised qualifying criteria before the mop-up allotment is intended to ensure it did not push the allotment process into disarray and upset the schedule.
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