SC to hear plea regarding filling of 5,000 vacant MBBS, BDS seats

The Supreme Court will on Friday hear a plea regarding filling of around 5,000 vacant MBBS and BDS seats across the country pertaining to the academic session 2016-17.

A petition filed by the Sankalp Trust, urged the top court to fill all seats in all medical and dental colleges by way of centralised counselling and on the basis of the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) ranking of the candidates.

Due to controversies over new rules on allotting seats and admission procedures of medical seats, a very large number of seats have been left vacant, even after beginning the classes.

The reasons cited in the petition stated that due to the situation created by the introduction of NEET and late finalisation of modalities of the counselling processes for admission to medical and dental colleges most of the seats in various states could not be filled by September 30.

The apex court had earlier ordered for combined counselling for all unfilled medical seats in Maharashtra.

The top court had also clarified that the admissions already made would not get affected. Thousands of medical students, who cleared NEET this year, have already got seats in various colleges.

This year NEET was made mandatory for admission to private and deemed institutes, just two days before the AIPMT held on May 1.