Delay in UHS entrance test result irked prospective students

Lahore, After a passage of four months, the University of Health Sciences (UHS) has not been able to complete the process for admission to 11 medical colleges of the province.

The Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISE) Lahore announced the intermediate result on August 15, but students interested in getting admission in medical colleges, are still uncertain about their future. For the last two years, the UHS has been conducting entrance tests for FSc (pre-medical) and A-level students. This year, the university conducted the test in September, in which 20,228 students appeared, of which 14,981 were declared eligible for admission in medical and dental colleges.The number of seats in 11 medical colleges is 1,961, including KEMU Lahore 262; AIMC Lahore 240; FJMC Lahore 160; SIMS Lahore 142; Nishter Medical College Multan 229; Punjab Medical College Faisalabad 251; RMC 251; Quaid-e-Azam Medical College Bahawalpur 249; Sheikh Zayed Medical College Rahim Yar Khan 78; Sargodha Medical College Sargodha 59; and Nawaz Sharif Medical College Gujrat has 40 open-merit seats.

The UHS displayed its first list on November 16. After the displaying of the list, several students who cleared the entrance test enrolled in private medical colleges. According to rules, private medical colleges can admit students once the first list is displayed. Sana Ashraf, a private medical college student, said, "It is negligence on the part of the university because it displayed the first list after four months. Now it is displaying the second list after an interval of one month. The UHS has also announced to display I would display the third list in January 2010."

Muhammad Haseeb, another student, said that due to the delay, students were compelled to seek admission in pharmacy, biochemistry and biotechnology courses. A Punjab University (PU) official said admissions in various medicine-related disciplines had been affected due to the negligence of the UHS. Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) Joint Secretary Dr Shahid Malik said there was lack of coordination among the institutions. He said, "We should regularise a central admission department to restructure the admission procedure." UHS Public Relations Officer (PRO) Muhammad Atif said they had completed the admission process in limited time and performed well under available resources and time. He said the UHS conducted the entry test on September 27 and announced the result next day.