Bhubaneswar, April 19: A group of in-service doctors, who had been selected for admission to the postgraduate (PG) medical course this year, today protested against the sudden decision of the PG selection committee to include some of those who could not get admission to the course last year.
These students had obtained an order from the high court stating that they should be given grace marks and admitted to the course this year.
However, their inclusion in the list for admission to the course has affected the ranking of students who alleged foul play by the PG council selection committee.
The protest today led to the stalling of the counselling process for the admissions. The authorities, however, said they were following the court’s order and denied any foul play.
Sangeeta Mishra, one of the aspirants, said the selection committee had prepared a merit list of 47 in-service doctors eligible for the PG course this year. The list was made public on April 10 and revised on April 16. The date for counselling had been fixed for today.
“When we checked the Internet today, we found that 27 new candidates had been added to the list and our rankings had changed. We were shocked to see our rankings drop in the new list,” said Mishra, whose initial rank was 21, but has changed to 40 in the new list.
These newly included in-service doctors were from the 2011 batch. After failing to qualify last year, they had moved the high court saying that 38 questions in their exams were incorrect.
They wanted grace marks for those. They even approached the Supreme Court, which referred the matter to the high court. The high court ordered the committee to select these doctors for post-graduation study.
The fresh batch of in-service doctors said the director of the medical education and training department had assured that only after seats for the 2012 batch were filled up, the unsuccessful candidates would be allowed to take admission.
“However, everything changed. As the counselling is to be held today, we even cannot approach the court. As our ranks have gone down in the new list, we will not get our preferred branch,” said Balaram Behera, another doctor.
However, the PG council selection committee members said the newly included 27 doctors had approached the court. The committee had told the court that they would give admission to these doctors after the fresh batch of doctors took admission.
“We had selected 47 in-service doctors from the entrance exam held on January 21 this year. However, last evening we received a court directive to include the 27 students in a combined list,” said Umakant Satpathy, selection committee coordinator.
Satpathy said as the Medical Council of India had set April 24 as the deadline for completing the counselling process, the committee had fixed April 19, 20 and 21 for counselling.
DMET P.K. Dash said the committee would put its facts in court and the counselling for in-service doctors would be held on another day.
