Punjab gives MBBS seats to four unrecognised colleges

LAHORE, The Punjab government has allocated 100 MBBS seats each for the under-construction four medical and dental colleges in the public sector which are not recognised by the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC), sources told Dawn on Monday.

The PMDC officials called it a serious violation of the council’s ordinance and rules.

Sources said the Punjab government had allocated 100 MBBS seats each for the under-construction medical colleges in Sialkot, Gujranwala, Dera Ghazi Khan and Sahiwal. These colleges are not recognised by the PMDC so far and are not functional as yet.According to sources, the Punjab health department directed the University of Health Sciences (UHS) to grant affiliation to these four colleges.

Talking to Dawn, Punjab health additional secretary Mushtaq Ahmad Sulehria said the provincial government had allocated 100 seats each for the four under-construction colleges nearing their completion.

He said though these medical colleges had not been recognised by the PMDC so far, the Punjab government was authorised to allocate seats for these medical colleges before recognition by the council.

He said the health department had directed the UHS management to affiliate these medical colleges so that eligible candidates could get admissions in these colleges after the declaration of Entrance Test results. He said the construction of these colleges was likely to be completed by the end of this year.

To a question, the official said the Punjab government would apply for the recognition of these colleges after the Entrance Test results.

Talking to Dawn, PMDC registrar Dr Ahmad Nadeem Akbar said the four medical colleges were not on the list of recognised public sector medical colleges in the province.

“The PMDC has not recognised these medical colleges. So, the Punjab government has no right to allocate MBBS seats for these colleges,” he said adding, such step would be considered a criminal act and serious violation of the PMDC Ordinance.

The registrar said the Punjab government’s decision would also be considered a violation of the Para 279 of a Supreme Court’s reported verdict (PLD 2007 SC 323).

According to the apex court’s judgment, Dr Akbar said, no provincial government could allocate seats for MBBS classes if the medical college did not fulfill requirements of the PMDC.

He said the Punjab government was playing with the future of students, as the PMDC would not allow them to get admissions in the said colleges unless these colleges got recognition certificates from the council.

He said the PMDC had recognised 13 government medical colleges across the province which are: Allama Iqbal Medical College, Lahore (being re-inspected for seat allocation), Army Medical College, Rawalpindi (allowed 200 MBBS seats per year), Fatima Jinnah Medical College, Lahore (250 seats), King Edward Medical University, Lahore, (being re-inspected for seat allocation), Nishtar Medical College, Multan (250 seats), Punjab Medical College, Faisalabad (being re-inspected for seat allocation), Quaid-i-Azam Medical College, Bahawalpur (300 seats), Rawalpindi Medical College, Rawalpindi (being re-inspected for seat allocation), Services Institute of Medical Sciences, Lahore (150 MBBS seats), Sargodha Medical College, Sargodha (100 seats), Shaikh Zayed Medical College, Rahim Yar Khan (100 seats), Nawaz Shairf Medical College, Gujrat (50 seats) and Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan Medical College, Lahore, (100 MBBS seats per year).