CM holds meet on SC order on seat sharing

BANGALORE: Karnataka Chief Minister S M Krishna on Friday held a review meeting to discuss the fallout of the Supreme Court order that fixed 50-50 as the seat sharing formula between the state government and college management for 2003-04.
The government cancelled the CET admission process on Thursday as the seats were being filled on a 75-25 seat sharing formula.
With the Supreme Court order, the government is now forced to rework the seat matrix (the college-wise, branch-wise allocation of seats between the government and managements).
After the meeting, Higher Education Minister G Parameshwara told reporters that the government had decided to rework the seat matrix for medical, dental and engineering courses.
On the question of conducting a fresh round of counselling, he, however, did not clarify the government''s stand.
"We are yet to decide on whether the entire process has to be conducted afresh or not. A decision will be taken shortly," he said.
Parameshwara said that the SC''s October 2002 order in the TMA Pai Foundation case had raised several doubts on the governments'' and managements'' rights during admissions. "With the five-judge bench order, our doubts have been more or less clarified," he said.
The five-judge bench order vindicated the state government''s stand that managements did not have absolute rights of admission on all seats. The government has equal rights.
"With the SC brushing aside the managements contention of absolute rights, our rights have been upheld," the minister said.
About the formation of two committees for fee and management quota and the 2003-04 fee structure, Parameshwara said a committee would be constituted to decide the fee structure this year.
"The committee will finalise the fee structure for all colleges. After the SC order, the fee structure based on the Karnataka high court''s order has to be revised," he said.
When asked about the delay on the commencement of the academic year, Parameshwara said that the delay was unfortunate but such delays had occurred on several occasions. The government fully understood the agony of parents and students.
Karnataka has 2,452 medical seats, 1,625 dental seats and 31,113 engineering seats in 27 medical colleges, 35 dental colleges and 107 engineering colleges. The government has already completed medical and dental admissions for Karnataka and non-Karnataka category, engineering for non-Karnataka category. The admission process for engineering courses for Karnataka category has already begun.
The five-judge Supreme Court bench had also banned capitation fee.