PESHAWAR: The government has doubled the number of seats allocated in medical and dental colleges for the students of tribal districts for the academic session 2022-23.

The decision, taken by Pakistan Medical Commission (PMC), has been conveyed to the provincial health department and Khyber Medical University (KMU), the admitting varsity in the province.

Sources told this scribe that PMC had reduced seats in medical colleges for the students of newly-merged districts which created unrest among them. They said that the allocation of seats in different public sector medical and dental institutes had been reduced to 136 from 290 for former Fata.

They said that the number of quota-based seats for Balochistan had also been decreased to 29 from 113. PMC has informed the vice-chancellor of KMU, Prof Ziaul Haq, about the number of eats in November of the current year.

Additional seats distributed among 14 medical and dental colleges in KP

The government had increased the number of seats to 290 in academic year 2021-22 while seats for Balochistan were enhanced from 29 to 113 in public sector medical and dental colleges of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The decision to enhance seats had been made through Federal Cabinet Division Islamabad in a meeting held on March 2, 2017 with the then prime minister in the chair. The meeting decided that the quota for students of tribal areas in education and health institutions in all provinces should be doubled and retained for 10 year after its merger with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

In compliance with the same decision and letters by Higher Education Commission and Pakistan Medical Commission, the KMU implemented the directives for two years and double seats were allocated to the students in 2021 and 2022.

However, official sources said that reduction in seats by PMC for that academic session caused unrest among the students, who were demanding admission as per 2021 and 2022 policy.

The candidates and their parents started agitation and protest against the government as they were demanding increase in the number of seats. However, neither KMU nor the provincial government had the authority to increase or decrease the number of seats in any medical and dental college of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

It was the prerogative of PMC to allocate seats in any medical and dental college of Pakistan and KMU, the admitting university, would fill only the allocated number of seats, sources said.

PMC clarified that it would be one-time increase in the number of seats as it was made provisionally on the requests of the provinces and in the best interests of the students. In future, the colleges wanting to raise number of seats should make arrangements for mandatory inspections by PMC to stand eligible for the increase, it said. It added that increase in seats would be linked with inspections.

Sources said that PMC had been arguing that it would deteriorate the standard of medical education if it kept admitting more students in colleges with the present infrastructure that was meant for less number of students. They said that medical and dental colleges were being allowed specific number of seats after inspection and it was not a good practice to accommodate more students than the number permitted by PMC.

Prof Ziaul Haq told Dawn that not a single candidate could be enrolled into PMC’s portal over and above the allocated number of seats. He said that KMU was required to induct students on the seats notified by PMC.

He said that a final meeting of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government and PMC recently decided to reinstate the quota for students of tribal districts. He said that the number of seats for Balochistan’s tribal areas was also doubled.

“The increased seats have been distributed among the 14 public medical and dental colleges in the province,” said Prof Zia.

Published in Dawn, December 26th, 2022