MCAT Pakistan

National Medical & Dental College Admission Test (NMDCAT) is a test conducted in Pakistan each year for admissions in MBBS and BDS degree programs. It is a pre-requisite for admission in all medical and dental colleges (both public and private) in Pakistan.[1]

NMDCAT is conducted by the Pakistan Medical Commission on a national level through a testing agency, National Testing Service. In 2020, the test replaced the provincial medical entrance exams conducted in the past. Provincial medical entrance exams included the MDCAT conducted by the University of Health Sciences, Lahore in Punjab and Balochistan before the NMDCAT. It was implemented in 1998 as the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) on the initiative of the then chief minister of Punjab Mian Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif to counter replete cheating in HSSC exams at the time. Other provinces also started conducting their medical entrance exams in the years to follow. From 1998 to 2007, it was conducted by the King Edward Medical University, Lahore. From 2008, University of Health Sciences, Lahore conducted the test in Punjab. Initially, Institute of Business Administration used to conduct a centralized medical entrance exam for public colleges in Sindh. Later, as the PMDC regulations were amended, National Testing Service (NTS) started to conduct a centralized Entry Test for Public and Private Medical Colleges in Sindh. Educational Testing and Evaluation Agency (ETEA) used to conduct the provincial medical entrance exam before the NMDCAT in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

In 2020, over 125,000 students registered for the NMDCAT from all over the country. Meanwhile the seats are limited as there are some 3405 seats for admissions solely based on previous academic record (locally called open merit format) in public medical colleges and some 216 open merit seats in public dental colleges of Punjab only. In addition, some seats are reserved for foreign and dual nationality holders. There are also 76 seats for overseas Pakistanis. Overseas Pakistanis are not charged higher tuition fee as opposed to foreign nationals who pay around $10,000 per year, which is often far less compared to many institutes in other parts of the world.

NMDCAT consists of multiple choice questions. Each question carries 1 mark with no negative marking for wrong answers. Total score is 200. 80 questions are reserved for Biology, 60 for Chemistry, 40 for Physics, and 20 for English language.

The syllabus for the exam is available on the website of Pakistan Medical Commission. The results of the NMDCAT 2020 were announced on December 16th, 2020. The exam achieved a 0.96 on Cronbach’s alpha and was determined to be extremely reliable and consistent with its structure and objectives.

Controversies

20 additional marks are given to students who have memorised the Quran in their Intermediate exams. This additional mark sometimes prevent non-Muslim students from getting into the merit list of Medical entrance. In 2012, a Christian student went to Lahore High Court because he didn't get into the merit list but his Muslim peers with marks less than him got into the merit list due to this additional 20 marks. But his plea was dismissed by the Lahore High Court.[2]

In 2020, the date of the NMDCAT clashed with the Hindu festival of Diwali. The Hindu students and activitists protested against it. The Hindu civil rights activist Kapil Dev said “If you don’t schedule exams on your Eid, how come you schedule it on Diwali?". However despite these protests, the Pakistan Medical Commission refused to change the date of NMDCAT.[3]

Protests sprang up in Punjab as it included topics out of the syllabus of UHS as the syllabi by all the Admitting Universities were already released in accordance with the now defunct PMDC Regulations, 2020. PUMHSW (the Admitting University of Sindh as per the defunct PMDC Regulations, 2020) had also announced the date of Entry Test in Sindh and the National Testing Service had also issued the admit cards in accordance with the directives by Government of Sindh. It must be noted that Sindh government heavily criticised the federal government on introducing a centralized test for admissions and did not allow them to conduct NMDCAT in Sindh. However, it was on November 11th, 2020, the Entry Test was cancelled by the Sindh High Court and the NMDCAT by PMC was declared legal and constitutional. It led to chaos and confusion among students from all over the country as the provincial entrance exams were cancelled only two weeks before and a centralized medical entrance exam came into existence for the first time. On November 11th, 2020, the NMDCAT was delayed by Sindh High Court as key bodies weren’t formed by the PMC in order to structure the syllabus and the date. After the formation of National Medical and Dental Academic Board, the Pakistan Medical Commission approved the syllabus and conducted the NMDCAT on November 29th, 2020.

After the results were conducted, large protests over the alleged discrepancies in the results took place all over the country which led to PMC giving the option of recounting.

See also

References
  1. WAQAS A KHAN (10 September 2017). "Cruel MCAT and ECAT". Pakistan Today. Retrieved 1 August 2020.
  2. ali usman (30 October 2016). "For minority students, no marks for learning scriptures". Retrieved 1 November 2020.
  3. "Hindu students protest over MCAT admission test clashing with Diwali". Samaa. 4 November 2020. Retrieved 14 November 2020.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1587542/uhs-told-to-decide-on-nmdcat-syllabus-dispute

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