PESHAWAR: The students have opposed the decision of Khyber Medical University to include marks of special FSc examinations in the merit list of Medical and Dental Colleges Admission Test (MDCAT), claiming it would affect the original merit prepared after regular examinations.

KMU has asked the students, who got special marks or those with delayed results of A Level examinations, to submit their results before February 4 for admission to medical and dental colleges.

The students while talking to Dawn said that government didn’t hold intermediate examinations due to Covid-19 in 2020 and conducted the same in 2021 in only three subjects (for FSc) including physics, chemistry and biology.

They said that candidates obtained high marks in the three subjects but less marks in MDCAT owing to which Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab governments announced to arrange special FSc examinations through executive orders without any legislation.

Ask KMU not to consider marks obtained in special exam

They believe that the students getting higher marks in special examinations would come ahead of them in the merit list.

On November 8, 2021, KMC, the admitting university for medical and dental colleges in the province, invited applications for online admission without mentioning that the marks obtained by students in special examinations would be included in the merit list. On December 9, KMU displayed merit list, showing the students of special examinations with their original marks in the regular examinations.

Abdul Jamil, an affected student, said that Pakistan Medical Commission (PMC), regulator of medical education in the country, had already termed the special examinations a political tool with no legal status.

It indicated that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab should include the special examination marks not in the current academic session but in the next session 2022, he added.

However, officials said that KMU had to follow any regulations announced by PMC issued from time to time. In line with PMC’s directives, KMU decided to consider delayed results of all candidates for FSc/A Level whether fresh or repeater for improvement after detailed discussion with the vice-chancellors of other admitting universities such as University of Health Sciences (UHS) Lahore, National University of Medical Sciences Rawalpindi and Bolan Medical University Quetta, they said.

“All these admitting universities are accepting delayed results for both fresh candidates and improvers,” they said.

The enraged students said that new academic session started in September every year and KMU began uploading the new merit list till January 24 in accordance with the results of special examinations announced on January 12.

They said that five boards of intermediate and secondary education in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had conducted special FSc examinations in which 800 to1,000 candidates appeared.

Due to special examination, many students improved their score in FSc and went ahead of their colleagues on the merit list prepared in line with the original examinations, they added.

They said that they would move court against the new policy wherein the students getting more marks in special examinations would affect the merit list and many of them who were eligible to get admission in medical and dental colleges would lose their chance.

The students said that KMU shouldn’t give weight to the marks obtained by candidates in special examinations to facilitate the deserving ones.

Officials, however, said that KMU never issued any instructions to candidates not to take special FSc examination and it was the decision of each and every candidate either to sit in special examinations or not.

Last month, KMU, in response to a call attention motion in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, said that in accordance with PMC’s decision all the admitting universities should consider the students with delayed results of A Level and others were including all the students before February 4.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2022