Govt, minority colleges agree on seats, fee

A breakthrough has been finally achieved between the government and the minority colleges on seat-sharing and fee structure for medical and dental courses.

Three medical and six dental colleges under the Karnataka Religious and Linguistic Minority Professional Colleges Association on Friday consented to charge the same fee agreed with the colleges under the Karnataka Professional Colleges Foundation.

The association has a total of 350 seats in three medical colleges and 300 in six dental colleges, according to its secretary Shafi Ahmed. Of these, the association will give 25% to the government.

“The agreement reached today is only between the government and the religious minority colleges. A section of the linguistic minority colleges, which was earlier under the association, has not yet discussed the issue with the government,” he said.

Accordingly, the association will charge Rs 70,000 for an MBBS seat and Rs 45,000 for a BDS seat under the government quota in these colleges. For 55% of the seats to be filled through the National Eligibility-cum- Entrance Test, the fees will be Rs 5.75 lakh for MBBS and Rs 3.90 lakh for BDS. The remaining 20% seats will be under the management quota and the fees will be decided by the managements themselves.

Medical Education Director S S Harsoor said: “There are as many as 280 medical seats and a number of dental seats in seven linguistic minority colleges with whom an agreement is yet to be reached. I was told that the head of the linguistic minority colleges association was not well. So, nobody turned up for the meeting on Friday.”

He said the agreement was expected to ensure that all the seats are added to the Common Entrance Test matrix at one time during the second round of seat allotments.

The second round began on July 14 without medical seats from the minority colleges and will go on till July 17. “We want to add all the seats together to the matrix to avoid any confusion among students,” Harsoor said.