HYDERABAD, Dec 15: The female students with their parents staged a protest demonstration outside the Hyderabad press club here on Saturday against the Sindh health department decision to hold the pre-entry test for admission to the medical colleges of Sindh for the third time.
Talking to newsmen, the parents, Mrs Iqbal, Syed Afroz Ali and Jarar Kazmi, and the candidates, Sobia Iqbal, Sana Batool, Ali Bano, Iqra and others said that the students had cleared the pre-entry test twice but were again being asked to appear in the test for the third time which was a great injustice to them.
They said that only for 30 to 35 candidates, the pre-entry test was being held for the third time.
“Why should we suffer for the mistakes of the IBA”, they asked and added that since they had cleared the pre-entry test on two occasions, they were fully entitled to get admission to the medical colleges.
Meanwhile a 15-member delegation of the parents and the students called on Hyderabad District Nazim Dr Makhdoom Rafiquzzaman at his office and apprised him of the situation arising out of the decision of the provincial health department to cancel the results of the pre-entry test for admission to medical colleges of the province.
They told the Nazim that 110 students had been declared successful from Hyderabad district while only 35 candidates had been affected throughout the province.
Dr Rafiquzzaman extended support to the students’ just cause and demanded of the Sindh governor, health minister and secretary to accommodate all the candidates from Hyderabad district in the admission to Liaquat University of Medical and Health Science, (LUMHS) Jamshoro.
PMA: The president of Pakistan Medical Association (PMA), Sindh chapter, Dr Noor Mohammad Memon, in a statement has said that the issue of the pre-entry test had become a comic story for the readers of newspapers and added that the mess created by the IBA had exposed its so-called integrity and competency.
He regretted that the students and their parents had been inflicted mental torture for no fault of theirs. He said that the sense of judgment of the decision makers who were perhaps enjoying the drama was surprising.
Dr Memon pointed out that the vice chancellor of the LUMHS had expressed reservations on entrusting the job of pre-entry test once again to the IBA.
He said that it was high time the authorities did not make it a point of prestige, accepted the reality and altogether discarded pre-entry test especially when the intermediate boards had now established their transparency and credibility as claimed by the chairman of the Karachi board.
He said that this claim was further fortified by the result 2000-2001 of the Hyderabad board. Quoting figures, he said that during the year 2000 the percentage of successful candidates was 11.50 per cent only while in 2001 it was 25.27 per cent.
The PMA leader added that the results spoke for themselves and asked, “what else do the authorities expect from an examining institution of good standard”.
He said that the situation had been reversed as the IBA had been placed in the position occupied by the intermediate boards a few years ago which had necessitated the introduction of pre- entry test.
He demanded that the pre-entry test should be done away with or should be given the status of aptitude test only as was done by the NED university and the intermediate board results should be given due weightage.