Bhubaneswar, May 7: Around 34,000 students from Odisha appeared for the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) today for admission into undergraduate courses in medical colleges across the country.

The national level eligibility test by the Central Board of Secondary Education was conducted in three cities - Bhubaneswar, Berhampur and Rourkela - and across 20 centres.

A number of students, for the first time, took the examination in Odia after the central government included the Odia language as a medium of examination in the test.

There was outrage in the state after the health ministry allowed six regional languages - Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, Tamil and Telugu - for the all-India medical test, but excluded Odia.

Chief minister Naveen Patnaik had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 22 to include Odia language as a medium in NEET.

Students started reaching the examination centre from 7.30 am and continued till 9.30 am. They were made to enter the examination halls in two slots. The examination started at 10 am.

"We ensured that the students followed the examination guidelines. The purpose was to avoid unfair practices," said an invigilator.

This year, about 11.5 lakh candidates registered for NEET- 2017 for 56,000 medical and dental seats in various colleges across the country.

Anusha Biswal, who appeared for the examination for the first time, said: "The paper was overall fine. Most of the questions were from the syllabus."

The state government will conduct counselling for 85 per cent seats in all medical colleges in the state, including private and deemed universities, from the current academic session. The private and deemed colleges can conduct counselling for only 15 per cent of the seats.

A notification issued by the Union ministry of health and family recently made it mandatory for all states to conduct common counselling for admissions into all MBBS and BDS courses, even in private and deemed institutes, from 2017-18.

The Directorate of Medical Education and Training (DMET) will conduct the counselling for admission into the medical colleges in Odisha along with Odisha Joint Entrance Examination (OJEE).

"Till last year, deemed universities had complete control over the admission process while the state government conducted counselling for a few seats in the private colleges. But, the state government has said that a common counselling will streamline the admission process," said OJEE chairman Tushar Kumar Nath.

Entrance examination for the postgraduate courses at Utkal University also began today. It will continue till May 15.

Health care

Sun Diagnostic Centre, Cuttack, a unit of Sun Hospital, introduced the first MRI mammography breast imaging facility in Odisha on Sunday. This facility is a significant milestone in health care in Odisha as it will make breast cancer diagnosis more accurate and reliable.