State to approach apex court

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The State Government has decided to approach the Supreme Court for extending the deadline of Medical PG admission in self- financing medical colleges to June 30. The decision was taken following the affidavit submitted by the Medical Council of India (MCI) in the High Court on Wednesday that the May 31 deadline could not be extended for self-financing colleges. The contention of the MCI was that the extension of the deadline was only applicable to all-India quota seats. The State Government had earlier announced that it was going ahead with the admission process to 50 per cent of post-graduate medical seats taken over from self-financing medical college managements (SFMCs) by scheduling the first round of allotment from June 28. Earlier this month, the UDF Government had taken over 50 per cent  seats as state quota to be filled from the state entrance rank list. The government had also cancelled the admissions conducted by managements to these seatsTalks inonclusiveMeanwhile, the talks between the self-financing engineering college managements and the cabinet sub-committee on Wednesday remained inconclusive with the Kerala Self-Financing Engineering College Managements Association taking a stand that they would sign an agreement only if they are allowed to collect Rs 75,000 as fees and Rs 1 lakh deposit for both management quota and government quota seats.This was the fees collected by the colleges under the Inter-Church Council which did not enter into an agreement with the State Government last year. The colleges under the Council had admitted students to all seats on their own.The stand of the Association was that the  differential fee would not have legal validity. The Association also put forward a demand that the special fees of Rs 25,000 collected from management quota students should be made applicable for government quota seats also.Representatives of the Inter-Church Council took the position that they would not agree for a differential fees structure. Apart from the representatives of the managements, Health Minister Adoor Prakash, Education Minister P K Abdu Rabb and Water Resources Minister P J Joseph attended the meeting. Finance Minister K M Mani, who was accused of taking a soft stand towards the Inter-Church Council, did not turn up for Wednesday’s meeting.