From a Correspondent
SHILLONG, July 30: The Khasi Students’ Union (KSU) has demanded a review of the selection of 18 candidates, 15 of them from Manipur alone, under the open quota for the indigenous communities of the Northeast for MBBS courses at North Eastern Indira Gandhi Regional Institute of Health and Medical Sciences (NEIGRIHMS), Shillong.
The KSU today questioned the NEIGRIHMS authorities as to why there was no candidate from the indigenous communities in Meghalaya among those selected for the MBBS courses at NEIGRIHMS and termed the selection process “unfair and partial”.
The 18 candidates selected under the open quota for the Northeast include 15 from Manipur and three from other States of the region. The entrance examination for the MBBS courses at NEIGRIHMS was held recently.
KSU leaders today met the director of NEIGRIHMS and demanded an immediate review of the results of the entrance test.
Briefing mediapersons after the meeting, KSU vice-president Daniel Khyriem said, “The NEIGRIHMS director has assured us that he will take up the matter with the Union Health Minister.”
Khyriem said, “The results of the  entrance examination display a complete subversion of ethics by those, including NEIGRIHMS, responsible for the conduct of the examination. It is impossible to perceive that there are so few qualified candidates from other States of the region.”
The NEIGRIHMS director told the KSU leaders that the seats under the Northeast quota had been secured by students from outside Meghalaya because they had taken “coaching classes”.
The KSU later demanded that the State Government should arrange for coaching classes for the youth of the State seeking to study MBBS courses.
According to the KSU, NEIGRIHMS was established at Shillong with the primary objective of serving the medical and academic interests of the region which has suffered neglect besides being underdeveloped. The benefit of the institute has to be shared by the seven sisters of the region in an equitable manner. “This current development (selection of candidates for MBBS courses at NEIGRIHMS) seems to be aimed at undermining this idea and therefore it needs to be condemned by all,” said Khyriem.