ISLAMABAD: The final list of students who have secured admission to medical and dental colleges has been finalised and issued.

According to a notification, the Pakistan Medical Commission (PMC) has created access to the list on its website for students who wish to check which college they have been admitted in. Colleges have been provided access to their final admitted lists on the PMC institutions portal as well and if any student or college has a concern they can inform the PMC by Feb 24 (today). Furthermore, the commission has made it clear that the admission of any student will not be altered.

In addition, the PMC has also placed 40 students of the defunct Bahawalpur Medical College who qualified on strict merit and prior application to colleges. The criteria applied was that the student had applied to another college previously and based on merit would have obtained a seat in another college. These students placed in different colleges on vacant seats have till Feb 25 to confirm their admission. In case they do not do so, the vacant seat will be placed in the national poll so the PMC may select another candidate.

In addition to this, a total of 300 seats on account of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) Scholarship Programme for erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) and Balochistan have been locked as the HEC process is underway and will conclude before Feb 28.

As per the final admitted lists for the session 2021-22 submitted by colleges and after due reconciliation as per the Vacant Seat Policy of PMC, a total of 7,592 students were admitted to public medical colleges across Pakistan leaving a total of 572 or 6.8pc of the seats vacant. In private medical colleges, a total of 8,317 students were admitted leaving a total of 284 or 3.2pc of the seats vacant. In public dental colleges, a total of 1,013 students were admitted leaving 155 or 12.7pc of the seats vacant. In private dental colleges, a total of 1,556 students were admitted leaving behind 906 or 36.7pc of the seats vacant. The large number of seats left vacant in private dental colleges includes five in Sindh with 365 seats available.

The total number of vacant seats in both, private and public medical colleges is 856 (5pc) whereas in dental colleges across Pakistan, 1061 seats were left vacant which represents 29.8pc of the total number of seats.

As per PMC’s policy, vacant seats in all medical and dental colleges after Feb 24 will be shifted to a national poll. PMC will be opening a portal for students who have not been admitted to any medical or dental college and are eligible for admission having qualified the MDCAT and having more than 65pc marks in Higher Secondary School Certificate (HSSC) examination.

Students can opt for admission to these vacant seats through the portal till Feb 27 and they will be admitted to the vacant seats strictly on merit with an additional qualification, as per which, on public vacant seats, students with merits higher than the lowest admitted merit in public colleges will be entertained to ensure no student of lower merit than the current lowest merit is admitted to a public college.

Published in Dawn, February 24th, 2022