Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami announced a scholarship for government school students who joined the MBBS course under the 7.5 per cent quota — he has also presented stethoscopes and aprons to 18 students and handed over seat allotment orders. The counselling is being conducted at the Jawaharlal Nehru Outdoor Stadium, which is a break from tradition — it has been held at the Kilpauk Medical College for many years.
The counselling for the medical aspirants who cleared NEET began in Tamil Nadu on Wednesday. Three toppers of the government school quota list — N Jeevithakumar from Government Model Higher Secondary School, Silvarpatti, S Anbarasan from Government Higher Secondary School in Kallakurichi and S Dhivyadharshini from Government Higher Secondary School in Chennai — have chosen to continue their education at the Madras Medical College. While Jeevithkumar scored a whopping 664 to top the list of government school students, Anbarasan scored 646 to grab the second rank and Dhivyadharshini scored 620 marks to come third.
Health Minister C Vijayabaskar released a rank list for MBBS and BDS admissions 2020-2021 at the Directorate of Medical Education office on November 16. He also released a separate rank list for the 7.5 per cent quota for government school students, government quota seats in government medical colleges and self-financing medical colleges and management quota seats for self-financing colleges. First copy of the rank list was received by Health Secretary J Radhakrishnan and Selection Committee Secretary G Selvarajan.
The Selection Committee received 24,714 applications for MBBS and BDS seats, among them 23,707 were accepted. The committee received 15,885 applications from the State board students, 7,366 from CBSE and SSCE students, 285 from Indian School Certificate Examination and 171 from other boards. According to the Selection Committee data, 9,596 students who applied have graduated in the current year and 14,111 students were from previous years. Total 972 applications were received from students for 7.5 per cent reservation, among them 951 were accepted.
Speaking to the press after releasing the rank lists, the Health Minister said, "Time slots and dates will be allotted to the students and per day 500 students will be called for the counselling. After special counselling, counselling for 7.5 per cent special reservation will be conducted."
The minister said there are chances of government schools students getting 405 seats, 313 MBBS and 92 BDS seats, under 7.5 per cent reservation. There are 3,650 MBBS seats in 26 government medical colleges. Among them, 227 MBBS seats and 12 BDS seats are reserved for 7.5 per cent special reservation. In 15 self-financing colleges, there are 2,100 MBBS seats are there, among them 1,061 are reserved for State quota and 86 are for 7.5 per cent special reservation.
