Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government on Tuesday introduced a bill to provide for admission to MBBS and BDS courses on the basis of marks obtained in the higher secondary examination instead of Net.
The government also moved another bill to continue the present system of admission to post graduate courses in medicine and dentistry too. The bills were moved by health minister C. Vijayabaskar in the Assembly, following demands by opposition leaders, including the DMK working president M.K. Stalin.
The government said the Union government had amended the Indian Medical Council Act, 1956 and the Dentists Act, 1948 to conduct a uniform entrance examination to all medical educational institutions and dental educational institutions at the undergraduate level.
The state government said the bulk of the students who would appear for the uniform entrance examination from Tamil Nadu come from rural areas and facilities for them to access coaching classes are not available due to paucity of funds and economic conditions in the areas.
“It has been opined that the uniform entrance examination has become traumatic experience for the parents and children, as it appears to determine at one stroke, the future of the child”, it said.
The government said the higher secondary examination itself is a serious examination of merit casting a high burden on students and is itself very much an entrance test to get admitted to higher level course and admission to professional courses.
The syllabus, methodology and the content of the uniform entrance examination (NEET) is based on the syllabus prescribed for the CBSE, which is different from that prescribed by the board of higher secondary examination in Tamil Nadu, the government noted.
As far as the post graduate course admissions are concerned, the government said an all India entrance test would throw out of gear the objective of the state in providing quality health care to the rural and needy people.
Under the present system of PG admission, 50 per cent of the seats in each speciality is allocated to the doctors in government service. On selection, the government doctors are required to serve the government for two years after completion of the course. This is done with the objective of providing quality health care to people of Tamil Nadu, particularly those living in rural, remote and hill areas.
