Punjab State Pharmacy Council ignores order to disaffiliate colleges

Tribune News Service

Rajmeet Singh

Chandigarh, October 28

The Punjab State Board of Technical Education and Industrial Training and Punjab State Pharmacy Council ignored the instructions of Medical Education and Research Department to disaffiliate private pharmacy colleges that admitted students who cleared their school examinations from unapproved boards.

Answer sheets in safe custody

• The Punjab Vigilance is already probing the suspected anomalies in admissions to private pharmacy colleges and the conduct of exams in two-year diploma courses for academic years 2019-20 to 2021-22
• The board, which looks after the admissions and examination, has also been told to keep in safe custody the answer sheets for three years

The Punjab Vigilance is already probing the suspected anomalies in admissions to private pharmacy colleges admissions and the conduct of examinations in two-year diploma courses for three academic years — from 2019-20 to 2021-22. The board, which looks after the admissions and examination, has also been told to keep in safe custody the answer sheets for the three years.

The Department of Medical Education and Research wrote to Punjab State Pharmacy Council in February 2019 regarding the direction to the Punjab State Board of Technical Education and Industrial Training to disaffiliate the colleges that have admitted students who have passed senior secondary school examination from unapproved boards and cancel their registration, affecting hundreds of students.

The general body meeting of the council, in its meeting held on October 6, 2020, while citing the state government instructions, decided to give last-time relief to students who have passed Class XII from the University of Technology of Sciences, Raipur, Board of School and Technical Education, Apex Professional University, Arunachal Pradesh and the Arunachal University. The council also decided that after 2020, no admissions would be given to students who have passed their Class XII exams from unapproved boards.

In the past, the private pharmacy colleges verified the educational certificates of candidates. It was, however, found that the certificates were not being verified, as several diploma holders had cleared their school examination from boards of other states and there was a gap between Class X and Class XII. There are around 100 private pharmacy colleges in the state.

In a course correction, the board has now withdrawn the powers of private colleges to verify educational certificates of candidates. Now, principals of government polytechnics have been entrusted with the responsibility of verifying the certificates of students enrolled with private polytechnics.

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