Medical, dental admission tests held; parents urge health minister to increase number of seats

More than 87,000 students have taken the medical and dental admission tests while some parents urged the health minister to increase the number of seats in public medical colleges.

The exams were held between 10am and 11am on Friday at more than 30 centres across Bangladesh.

A combined GPA 8 in SSC and HSC examinations made one eligible for the test.

The pass-mark for the MCQ test is 40.

Bangladesh currently has 39 public medical and dental colleges and 98 private medical and dental colleges.

A total of 87,784 students sat the admission tests on Friday against 11,099 seats for the MBBS and BDS courses at all these colleges.

Of them, the public colleges have only 3,744 seats at the time while private colleges have 7,355 seats.

Health Minister Mohammed Nasim visited the Dhaka University’s Arts Building exam centre at around 10:30am.

But he did not enter the exam halls so as not to disturb the examinees and briefed the media outside.

Nasim also spoke with the parents waiting outside the Arts Building who took the opportunity to tell the minister of the need for seats in public medical colleges.

One of them said, “We are forced to send our children to private medical colleges as the number of seats in the public ones is limited.”

They said they would save money if they could send their children to public colleges.

The minister, however, did not respond to the suggestion.

When another parent urged him to take stern measures to prevent question paper leaks, Nasim said, “We are making the admission process suitable for talented students. We have shut down the coaching centres.”

“Some are still trying to cheat,” he said, adding that the law-enforcing agencies were nabbing them in quick succession.