LAHORE, Sept 14: The University of Health Sciences conducted on Sunday entrance test for 2008-09 session admissions to public and private medical colleges in Punjab.

As many as 18,264 candidates appeared in the test at 12 centres set up across the province. Of the total candidates, 12,285 were girls. This year, there are 2,156 MBBS and 157 BDS seats in the public medical and dental institutions in the province.

Provincial Police Officer Shaukat Javed, Chief Secretary Javed Mahmood, Additional Chief Secretary Javed Aslam and adviser to chief minister Jehanzeb Burki visited the two centres in Lahore.

UHS Vice-Chancellor Prof Hussain Mubashar told Dawn that the entrance test had been conducted in an immaculate and transparent manner and its result would be announced within 72 hours of the test.

The provincial secretaries supervised the centres set up at the UHS, Lahore Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education examination hall, the Shaikh Zayed School (Rahim Yar Khan), College of Engineering and Technology of the Islamia University (Bahawalpur), College of Engineering of the Bahauddin Zakariya University (Multan), and examination hall of the Dera Ghazi Khan Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, University of Agriculture (Faisalabad), University of Sargodha, Government Degree College Sahiwal, University of Gujrat and Gujranwala BISE examination hall central, Siddique Public School (Rawalpindi) and the Wah Engineering University (Wah Cantt).

This is the first time that UHS has conducted the entrance test. Earlier, the King Edward Medical University scrutinised applications while the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore, conducted the test since its introduction in Punjab in 1998.