Problem of ‘surplus’: Only 7 turn up against 240 vacant BDS seats

Faridkot, November 4

Only seven students turned up to fill the 240 vacant BDS course seats in eight dental colleges of the state. Facing the problem of ‘surplus’ in the dentistry course, the Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFUHS) has so far conducted six rounds of counselling to fill 1,350 BDS seats in 16 dental colleges.

In the latest, walk-in-interview 2nd extended stray vacancy round of counselling to fill the seats, the BFUHS was able to get only seven students. Of the 16 dental colleges, only eight have been successful in filling all their seats. In desperation to get more admissions, some colleges are even offering huge concessions in the government-fixed fee for the course.

Medical colleges are facing the problem of ‘plenty’ not just for the BDS course. The postgraduate medical courses have also failed to find students seeking admissions.

Even after reducing the eligibility criteria for admission to postgraduate medical courses to zero percentile in the NEET-PG entrance test, over 70 seats of Doctor of Medicine (MD) courses in non-clinical branches are lying vacant.