HUBLI: As a step towards arriving at a seat-sharing formula well in advance of next year's admission process to professional colleges, the State Government will be holding a second round of discussions with the Consortium of Medical, Dental and Engineering Colleges of Karnataka (COMED-K) in December.

Addressing presspersons here on Wednesday, Medical Education Minister V.S. Acharya said that a preliminary round of discussions was held with representatives of COMED-K recently.

The agreement that was implemented during the Common Entrance Test (CET) process during the current academic year would be further improved keeping the interests of students in mind, he said. Dr. Acharya claimed that both students and parents were happy with the current year's admission process and seat-sharing formula.

He said that during the preliminary round of discussions, managements of private professional colleges had responded positively to suggestions such as reduction in fees for payment quota. They had proposed the formation of a State-level authority for holding a single CET for admission to professional colleges, he said.

Dr. Acharya said the other three government medical colleges in the State would be functional from the next academic year.

Invitation

The invitation extended to private institutions to set up medical colleges in seven districts in the State had been received well and two institutions had evinced interest in the initiative to set up medical colleges in Chamarajanagar and Uttara Kannada, he explained.

To a query, the Minister said some of the private dental colleges in the State had been asked to improve facilities. The Dental Council of India had complained to the State Government regarding lack of adequate infrastructure and dearth of qualified teachers.

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