Panel slaps Rs 41 cr fine on medical, dental colleges for illegal admissions

By Vikas Vaidya

Coming down heavily on education barons particularly those running medical and dental colleges, Pravesh Niyantran Samiti, the regulating body to supervise admission in professional courses, has imposed a fine of whopping Rs 41 crore on 13 private medical and dental colleges for 206 illegal admissions done by them. For every illegal admission, the respective college has been directed to pay Rs 20 lakh each. This is a major jolt to these institutions, mostly belonging to political big-wigs cutting across party lines. One city-based private medical college N K P Salve Institute of Medical Sciences has also been hauled up by the panel for 11 illegal admissions to MBBS course for which Rs 2.20 crore fine has been imposed.
The committee headed by former High Court judge Justice (retd) D K Deshmukh had requested Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik to keep these admissions on hold for the academic year 2016-17 till the fine is not paid by the institutions concerned. The complaints originally lodged by parents who were not satisfied with the judgment as they wanted the admissions were to be cancelled. Two years ago, over 150 admissions made illegally were cancelled.
The committee had received several complaints from students and parents who had alleged that admissions to private unaided medical and dental colleges during the 2012-13 academic year were illegally done. These admissions have been done after second round of Centralised Admission Process (CAP).
Based on these complaints, Government had appointed committees to conduct enquiry. These committees submitted reports to Admission Control Panel. The committee, headed by Justice (retd) D K Deshmukh, convened the meeting which was attended by Dr Ravi Bapat, Dr M S Kekre, member secretary Medha Gadgil, Medical Education and Research Director Dr P H Shingare and retired IAS officer P E Gaikwad.
The committee has decided to regularise the admissions, subject to payment of Rs 20 lakh fine for each of the admission made by tweaking the norms. Pravesh Niyantran Samiti, in the year 2013, had disapproved admissions to over 200 MBBS and BDS seats in private medical and dental colleges. This was done on the basis of complaints lodged by parents.
The irony is that these admissions were done against the admissions of meritorious students who lost their seats. Most of these students are now in their final year.
The committee, in its written order, has said that the amount of the penalty shall be paid by the defaulting institutions within a period of four weeks from the date of publication of these minutes on the official website of the committee. The amount of penalty paid by these institutions should be forwarded to State Government, Samiti made it clear while recommending that at least a part of the amount be utilised for drought relief work.


Colleges on whom fine was imposed

Fee Fixation Committee has passed the order in a meeting. The colleges with fine are as follows

Colleges                                             fine in Rs    Illegal admissions
Terna medical college, Mumbai               2 crore           10
Terna Dental College                               3 crore           18
MIMER Medical college, Pune               1 crore           06
Vasantrao Pawar Medical, Nashik           1 crore          09
Navale Medical College, Pune                1.4 crore        07
Ulhas Patil medical, Jalgaon                    3.8 crore        19
NKPSIMS, Nagpur                               2.2 crore        11
Ashwini Rural Medical, Solapur              1.4 crore        07
Institute of Medical Sciences, Satara        7.6 crore        38
YMT Dental College, Navi Mumbai        3.4 crore        17
Yogita Dental College, Khed                   2.6 crore        13
Sinhgad Dental College, Pune                 7 crore            35
KBH Dental college, Nashik                 3.2 crore           16