Heavy penalty will be imposed on erring private medical colleges: Karnataka Govt on surrender of seats

Such an assurance has come from the State Health Minister while he was responding to a question from BJP member N Ravikumar in the Legislative Council. 

The government will impose a 'heavy penalty' on those who surrender government quota medical seats at the last moment after the final mop-up round of NEET-UG counselling, Medical Education Minister K Sudhakar said, as quoted by Deccan Herald.

Citing that there was a "loophole in the law" which was allowing private medical colleges in Karnataka to benefit from the surrender of medical seats, the BJP member referred to the fact that in the academic sessions 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 alone, altogether 1,227 seats had been surrendered.

In fact, it has further been alleged by Ravikumar that even though 1.19 lakh students appeared for the medical entrance exams, 89,539 students were eligible for admission, and 33,650 students attended the interview, only 8,535 students could secure their admission.

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Claiming that the practice of surrendering seats is a big mafia business, Ravikumar was quoted saying by Deccan Herald, "Some colleges give money to meritorious students to surrender the seats at the last moment, and sell them for a huge sum of money later. Poor, meritorious students are badly affected due to this."

However, the Health Minister claimed that even the private medical colleges have government quota seats and as per the Supreme Court's directions, in the seats which remain unallotted, the Government admits students on the basis of merit.

To this, Ravikumar questioned how so many seats remained unallotted during the last two academic sessions. Responding to this, the Health minister claimed that no Government quota seats were unallotted.

Following this, Ravikumar requested the Government for conducting another round of counselling so that all the seats could be filled up and he further said, "If the competition is this intense, how do certain seats get surrendered? A mafia involving some colleges and students are active in the state. The colleges inform about the surrender of the seats only at the last hour of the counselling, so that nobody can take them."

Responding to this, the Minister clarified that as per the ruling of the Supreme Court, only three rounds of counselling could be conducted, adds The Hindu.

However, as per the latest media report by Indian Express, the State Health Minister Sudhakar assured to take strict measures regarding the allegations brought against the private medical colleges and said, "Heavy penalty will be imposed (on erring private medical colleges) in case of surrender of seats. This will ensure that this trend does not continue in the coming years."