Sindh may reduce MDCAT passing marks

According to the News reported on Sunday. Sindh government is considering over the prospect of lowering the passing percentage of the recently held Medical and Dental Colleges Admission Test (MDCAT)

The objective behind the move would be to ensure that seats in the medical and dental colleges do not remain unoccupied.

which was revealed by Sindh Health Minister Dr Azra Fazal Pechuho as she addressed a press conference on Saturday at the Sindh Assembly.

The health minister informed media that the second option we were considering was that the province should conduct admission tests on its own for medical and dental colleges in the province.

She said the Sindh government had been bound to consider such options as a last resort, keeping in view the fact that candidates who appeared in the MDCAT were not satisfied with the admission test and concerned students were protesting against the testing system in Sindh, including other provinces as well.

Dr Azra said the Sindh government had been considering the option of preparing merit lists itself for admissions to medical and dental colleges of the province after lowering the minimum passing marks in view of the availability of seats in the educational institutions.

She mentioned that making the merit lists on its own would allow the province to fill all seats of its medical and dental colleges instead of inviting students from other provinces to take admissions on those unoccupied seats.

She appealed to the federal ministry of national health services, regulation and coordination to rapidly review the situation about MDCAT in order to protect the academic future of a large number of students in the country.

“We shouldn’t be compelled and pushed to the wall as it is the matter concerning the future of our children, and merely acting as a silent spectator on this issue is not an option for us,” she remarked.

She said the PMC had pursued an ill-advised policy and decided to increase the minimum passing percentage of MDCAT from 60% to 65% last year.

Dr Pechuho said there was no need to upsurge the minimum qualifying marks at a time when the education of college students had been extraordinarily affected due to the coronavirus lockdown.

“This unwarranted decision has darkened the future of our children as their academic careers are at stake. We have written a letter to make them understand the genuine problems of our students but they have been adamant on this issue,” said the health minister, talking about the PMC.

She said the province was fully authorized as per the law and constitution to devise its own policy and test system to offer admissions to its medical and dental colleges.

Dr Azra explained that owing to the unfair MDCAT system, 492 of the total 600 seats for bachelors of dental surgery available in the province had remained vacant last year. She added that similarly, the private medical colleges in Sindh had a total of 2,600 seats but 30% of them could not be filled last year.

She grieved the private medical and dental colleges in the province had been left with no option but to offer admissions to students belonging to other provinces to fill those seats.

Dr Azra warned that the province would face a shortage of doctors and dentists after four to five years as the non-native students would go back to their home provinces to practice their profession after finishing medical or dental education in Sindh.

The question papers of the MDCAT were based on the federal and Punjab’s syllabi while Sindh’s curriculum had not been considered when the questions were prepared, she said.

She went on to comment and said that the PMC had lost all its value when it failed to understand the problems of the concerned students. The commission should not conduct the admission test when it needed the capability to hold it in a proper manner,

Dr Azra recalled that the PMC had been imposed on the country through an ordinance without having the consent of all the federating units in Pakistan.

she said “Since the PMC came into existence, the hardships of doctors and students in the country increased while the federating units are also no closer to each other,”

The health minister was of the view that the PMC approved no benefit as it had failed to serve the nation and it also did not serve the cause of maintaining consistency and unity among the federating units.