Supreme Court turns down plea to fill medical seats across Maharashtra

The aspirants’ last attempt at trying their luck to bag vacant seats in medical and dental institutes was shot down by the Supreme Court on Friday after two separate petitions seeking extension of admission dates were dismissed

The aspirants’ last attempt at trying their luck to bag vacant seats in medical and dental institutes was shot down by the Supreme Court on Friday after two separate petitions seeking extension of admission dates were dismissed.

According to the petition filed by a Delhi-based NGO, over 5,000 seats remain vacant in institutes across the country this year, and students with good scores have been left without a seat. However, the SC bench refused to grant extension making it very clear that the vacant seats will now remain vacant throughout.

“Students who have done very well in both the state common entrance test (CET) as well as the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) have still been left without a seat. Many students have decided to drop an academic year and opt for the seats next year,” said Ruiee Kapoor, a parent. She added that several medical and dental seats in the state remain vacant despite various rounds of admissions and in desperation, many students have fallen to the lure of touts, to bag MBBS and BDS seats this year itself.

Parents are now planning to file a case of contempt against the state Directorate of Medical Education & Research (DMER) for not being able to fill up all the seats, despite having vacant seats and numerous applications from students. “The DMER was assigned the responsibility of filling up all seats this year and make the admission process easier on students. What happened instead was completely unfair and our children have been left in a lurch by the government,” said a parent. “We have approached lawyers to take this plea forward.”

When HT spoke to the DMER director, he said that almost all seats that were left vacant in the state were ordered to be filled by the institutes. “We also tried to get an extension from the SC to fill up vacant seats in the state many times, but were denied permission,” said Dr Pravin Shingare, director of DMER. He added that while six seats have been left vacant in government-run medical and dental institutes, the picture was still not clear on seats left vacant in private and deemed institutes in the state.