KARACHI, Oct 16: The provisional lists of candidates selected for admission to first year MBBS classes at the Dow Medical College (DMC) and the Sindh Medical College (SMC) would be displayed at the admission centre on Sunday.

The entry test conducting agency, the Bahria University, handed over the merit lists of 10,763 applicants for MBBS and BDS classes to a senior official of the Sindh health department on Saturday.

Talking to Dawn, Capt Ahmad Zaheer, director of the Bahria Institute of Management and Computer Science, said the test results gave to understand that merit had increased and there was good competition among the students aspiring for admissions to medical colleges. Majority of the seats were likely to be filled by A-1 or A graders.

He said that educational institutions had been asked to forward objections to the provisional lists, if received any from applicants, latest by October 22, while the final district-wise merit lists would be handed over back on October 30.

The Vice-Chancellor of the Dow University of Health Sciences, Dr Masood Hameed Khan, said that a provisional list had been received by the DMC and the same would be available for observation by applicants from Sunday at the college.

The provisional merit list for admissions to 222 seats at the DMC closed at 83.45 per cent this year, while in the case of the SMC's 151 seats, merit list closed at 81.59 per cent. The cut-off marks in the merit list for DMC was 81.57 per cent last year.

Merit at the Larkana centre saw an eight per cent increase this year, increasing from 69.9 per cent last year to 77.06 per cent this year. Hyderabad admission centre's merit list closed at 76.97 per cent, up from 71.96 of last year's. Similarly, Sukkur centre's merit list closed at 77.69 per cent, up from last year's 74.78 per cent, said a source privy to the list compilation process.

The Dow University of Health Sciences will also place the results and merit list of candidates who had appeared in the entry test for MBBS from the Karachi centre on its website, www.duhs.edu.pk, adds PPI.