Only 40 students have applied for the 337 under-graduate medical and dental courses this year under the non-resident Indian (NRI) quota in Punjab in the first round of online counselling due to high tuition fee.
Baba Farid University of Health Sciences, Faridkot, on Thursday displayed the provisional merit list of candidates for admission to MBBS and BDS courses in the state’s 24 colleges under the NRI quota.
“We have received only 40 applications for the first round of counselling. Seven candidates are children of NRIs, who originally belong to Punjab, while 33 are children of NRIs from other states,” says university registrar Dr Ruhee Dugg.
“The reason for the low number of students opting for NRI quota MBBS and BDS seats is the high tuition fee. Students also have to account for other expenses during the five-year course, making it an expensive proposition,” says BFUHS vice-chancellor Dr Raj Bahadur.
MAIN SOURCE OF REVENUE FOR COLLEGES
NRI quota seats are the main source of revenue for medical and dental colleges.
{{/usCountry}}NRI quota seats are the main source of revenue for medical and dental colleges.
{{/usCountry}}A full course fee for an NRI quota MBBS seat is US$1.1 lakh (₹82 lakh) in all private and government medical colleges of the state.
The fee for NRI quota BDS seat is US$44,000 (₹32.8lakh).
According to the hiked fee structure this year, students of the government medical colleges of Amritsar, Patiala and Faridkot will pay Rs 7.8 lakh fee for MBBS, while students of Dayanand Medical College (DMC), Ludhiana; Adesh Medical University, Bathinda; and Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences, Jalandhar; will pay Rs 18.5 lakh for government quota seats and Rs 47.7 lakh for management quota seats. Sri Guru Ram Das University of Health Sciences, Amritsar, will charge Rs 47.7 lakh from both open merit and minority quota students.
The fee for BDS courses in government colleges is Rs 3.9 lakh, while students in private colleges will pay Rs 7.6 lakh under the government quota and Rs 10.3 lakh under the management quota.
SIMILAR TREND OVER THE YEARS
Last year, of the 316 MBBS and BDS seats under the quota, 279 seats remained vacant after all rounds of counselling.
In the 2018-19 session, 287 of the 309 NRI quota MBBS and BDS seats in the state had remained vacant.
The seats were later merged into the general category.
Nine medical colleges in Punjab offer 161 NRI quota MBBS seats. The number of BDS seats reserved for the NRI candidates in 15 dental colleges in the state is 176.
The result of the first round of counselling for NRI quota seats will be declared on November 19.