KARACHI, Oct 25: The number of applicants for admission to MBBS and BDS programmes at the government-run medical institutions in the province has declined this year.

According to a senior official at the IBA, about 5500 male and female candidates will appear in the entry test, which would be conducted on October 28 at three centres in the province. The institute had conducted the test of about 7200 candidates for MBBS and BDS courses last year, the official said.

In all, 982 seats, including 414 at the two government colleges in Karachi, have been allocated for the candidates domiciled in the province for admission to MBBS courses . The capacity at the colleges had also been reduced this year in line with the government’s policy to reduce the seats by 10 per cent every year, in order to improve the teacher-student ratio and bed-student ratio at teaching hospitals.

A senior official concerned with the admission process for the two colleges of Karachi said that about 2700 forms and 2500 IBA entry test forms were sold this year, whereas about 3000 prospectus and entrance test forms had been sold last year.

Viewing the reasons behind the decline of around 23 per cent in the number of applicants this year, a senior medical educationist said that this was perhaps due to strict marking in intermediate examinations.

The IBA official, however, said that the number of candidates appearing in IBA entrance test had decreased as some quota seats had been abolished this year, while candidates having BSc qualifications or having a gap of more than one year had also been declared ineligible to apply for admission.

Prof Abdul Hameed Khan, who is supervising the IBA entrance test for medical colleges, said that 2312 candidates would be taking examinations in Karachi, while another 1976 in Hyderabad and 1191 in Larkana.

He said that entrance test would be based on four subjects — Biology (45 questions), Chemistry (30 questions), Physics (20 questions and English (5 questions). The working of the overall merit of students for admission purpose would be based on thee following formula: Matriculation or equivalence marks - 10 % weightage, Inter Science adjusted marks - 40 % weightage and IBA entry test - 50% weightage.