Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, June 23: The students of Government Medical College Jammu today staged a protest against the proposed pooling of 50% of J&K PG seats in the All India Quota (AIQ).
Hundreds of MBBS students, interns and post interns gathered inside the College premises and raised slogans in support of their demand. The protesting students said pooling PG seats in All India Quota at this juncture would be of severe damage to the aspiring PG candidates of J&K as it would drastically reduce the number of UT seats which is already meager. They further added that the UT administration is mulling to participate in the All India Quota for PG seats for 50 percent of its total seat capacity from 2022.
“UT of J&K currently has a very small pool of PG seats comprising a few hundred seats unlike other States of India which participate in All India Quota and have thousands of medical PG seats”, said one of the protestors. “If the proposal is implemented, 50 percent seats from GMCs and 100 percent seats from SKIMS would be filled through the AIQ, only 172 seats would be reserved for the domiciled aspirants of J&K rendering a loss of 350 seats out of the total 542 seats available,” another student added.
The students further explained that MBBS courses have been started at five newly constructed Government Medical Colleges i.e GMC Anantnag, GMC Baramulla, GMC Rajouri, GMC Doda and GMC Kathua but no PG seats have been allotted to these colleges yet. The protesters stated that the increasing number of MBBS graduates from the UT necessitates the availability of more PG seats to be made available to the UT exclusively for proportionate accommodation.
The protesting students demanded that the idea of pooling J&K PG seats in AIQ be shelved until more post-graduate seats are allotted to new medical colleges in the Union Territory.
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