LAHORE, May 26: The Higher Education Commission has agreed to modify its GRE type test for medical and dental graduates seeking PhD scholarships. Responding to a suggestion of University of Health Sciences vice-chancellor Prof Dr Malik Husain Mubashar, HEC chairman Prof Dr Attaur Rahman said the commission could modify the test for students in biology/medicine in the future. "This will allow a better selection of persons, who are appearing in these subjects," he added.

Earlier last week, Prof Mubashar had written a letter to the HEC chairman stating that it was observed that most of the medical graduates did not perform well in the General Entrance Test in the present form when applying for PhD scholarships offered by the HEC.

He said the candidates' poor performance was mainly due to their inadequate knowledge of subjects like mathematics, bio-statistics, physics and chemistry, which they did not study during their MBBS course and post-MBBS clinical experience.

The VC suggested the commission chairman that not all the applicants for PhD scholarships should be given a uniform blanket test. He said the commission should earmark a percentage of the PhD scholarships for medical and dental candidates and gave them a different test based on the medical-related subjects, which they had studied in the last five years and were likely to pursue during their PhD programmes.