Talks delay sets dental students' teeth on edge

According to officials from Higher Education department, the Supreme Court has called for additional documents when the consensual agreement for 2010-11 was placed before the Supreme Court for approval last week.

The delay in approval has come as a setback to the government as private colleges have declared that seat-sharing discussions would commence once the consensual agreement was approved.

Admissions at stake

At stake is the future of nearly 1,100 dental students who have been admitted contrary to the Dental Council of India (DCI) rules. Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) has stated that they can approve these admissions once the consensual agreement has been approved by the Supreme Court.

Speaking to Deccan Herald, Karnataka Unaided Private Engineering Colleges Association Vice-President Pandurang Shetty said talks have been inevitably delayed to January. “We will begin talks once the consensual agreement has been approved,” he said.

Though the consensual agreement had been signed back in March 2010, there has been a delay in placing it before the Supreme Court for approval.

The delay was over the Justice V Gopala Gowda judgement of 2009, whereby the court struck down the practice of charging fees higher than that prescribed by the Fee Fixation Committee. The court had also struck down the practice of charging differential fee for the same course in the same college.

To get over this, Higher Education Minister V S Acharya announced that the government would de-link the consensual agreement from the Justice Gopala Gowda judgement, and the agreement would be placed for approval by the first week of December.
However, the same has not been done by the government.