By IANS,
Agartala : A large number of paramilitary and riot combat forces were deployed here Saturday after the opposition Congress threatened to disrupt the entrance test of a local medical college due to the state’s alleged discriminatory policies, police said.
The west Tripura district administration has also banned the assembly of five or more people in the capital city and its outskirts.
“A huge number of para-military, TSR (Tripura State Rifles), QRT (Quick Reaction Team) have been deployed,” the state’s Director General of Police K. Saleem Ali told reporters.
The Common Entrance Test (CET) for admission to MBBS and B.Sc nursing courses in the Tripura Medical College (TMC) will be held Sunday at the Maharaja Bir Bikram College here.
Congress has said that it will gather around 14,000 people and disrupt the CET, claiming that the Left Front government was adopting different policies for the state’s two medical colleges.
Tripura has two medical colleges with 100 seats each. One has been run by the state government and the other by a registered society, which is financially aided by the state government.
Of the 100 seats in the TMC, 55 seats are reserved for Tripura students, 30 seats for students of others states and 15 for the central pool.
“The Left Front government has been depriving the Tripura students, giving scope to the students of other states for admission to TMC,” opposition leader Ratan Lal Nath told reporters.
State Congress chief Surajit Datta said: “The state government is charging abnormally high tuition fee and other charges.”
The state government, however, said that the opposition was trying to “demolish the future of the MBBS students”.
“On the instruction of the Supreme Court, the state government has formed two committees headed by retired high court judges. These committees have been looking after the admission and fee issues in the TMC,” Tripura Health Minister Tapan Chakraborty told reporters.
“If we do not give scope to the students of other states, specially the northeastern states, where there is no medical college, how will the Tripura students get opportunities to study in other states of India?” the minister asked.