With a new norm for admission under institutional quota seats in BDS, the pool of applicants seeking admission in private colleges for Bachelor of Dental Surgery (BDS) is limited this year.
Unlike previous years, the qualifying threshold for BDS admission under institutional quota would not be lowered this year.
This is expected to lead to lesser admissions under institutional quota with which many private colleges were hoping to fill the vacancies.
The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has issued a notification regarding this following which a circular was issued by the Maharashtra Common Entrance Test (CET) Cell on Monday.
According to the CET Cell circular, candidates who had already registered for the State Quota seats by paying Rs 1,000 can now avail the institutional quota admissions by paying Rs 5,000. ‘Candidates who have paid additional Rs 5,000 will be eligible for institutional or NRI quota admissions in BDS. No new registration is allowed,’ states the circular.
In earlier practice, the qualifying criterion for admissions in BDS which is NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test) could be reduced for admissions under the institutional quota by private colleges. This has been done in the past wherein after the state concludes admissions, the qualifying NEET score would be lowered and a new registration process would start for those who are now eligible for BDS seat, due to reduced eligibility score of NEET.
‘But due to the new norm of no reduction in eligibility criterion, only those who had already registered for the state quota will now get to apply for admission at institutional level,’ said Brijesh Sutaria, a parent.