MH-CET pass rate at 5-year low on negative scoring, big syllabus

MUMBAI: Only 5.06% of the 1.48 lakh students who appeared for the medical common entrance test for 2014 qualified for MBBS and BDS courses, marking the lowest success rate in MH-CET in the last five years.
The test was replaced by NEET in 2013, but in the three years before that pass rates varied between 12-15%.
The plunge in performance was blamed on the introduction of a negative marking system and inclusion of both the Class XI and XII syllabi in the exam from this year.
The first two positions were bagged by Devesh Shilimkar and Vipul Jajoo, both students of Rajarshi Shahu college in Latur. Mumbai girl Prabodhini Gadhari stood third in the state and topped among girls.
Pravin Shingare, director, directorate of medical education and research, said: “This is the first time the syllabus of both class XI and XII were included in the CET exam. The students may not have been able to cope.”
Officials also claimed that students, fearing negative marks, didn’t attempt many questions, especially in physics. For every wrong answer, students lost one mark in the new marking scheme. There are 2,060 MBBS seats and 240 BDS seats in government colleges in the state this year.