NEW DELHI:: The Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Thursday circulated guidelines to all medical colleges for implementing 27 per cent OBC quota in admissions. “The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has decided to adopt the instructions as issued by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Department of Higher Education. As such, all central educational institutions under control of this ministry are requested to implement the orders of the Ministry of HRD in toto,” says the memorandum.

The ministry in its recent memorandum to all 12 medical colleges under it had requested them to initiate necessary action as per the provisions of the Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Act, 2006 to increase seats by upgrading infrastructure, creating additional faculty and other posts and earmarking additional budget. The HRD notification calls for reserving 27 per cent of seats for the OBCs apart from 15 per cent for SCs and 7.5 per cent for STs from the academic session commencing this year.