KARACHI  - A large number of students, their parents and civil society members here on Saturday staged a protest demo against the cancellation of National Testing Service (NTS) test results for admissions in government-run medical colleges and universities and demanded that merit and transparency be upheld in these admissions. 

According to details, a large number of people gathered outside the Karachi Press Club (KPC) and raised slogans against the provincial health department for cancelling the NTS entry test results. The demonstration, staged by Pasban-e- Pakistan, demanded withdrawal of the decision to hold fresh test for these admissions. 

Addressing the demonstrators, Pasban President Altaf Shakoor said that meritorious students were our most precious asset, and they should not be wasted through murder of merit. He said cancellation of the entry test results was injustice with the aspiring male and female doctors, who had already successfully passed the entry test. 

Altaf further said there was no proof of paper leak and that by re-holding the entry test, the vested interests of only those people would be served who wanted to kill merit in this country. 

He said the only beneficiary of this sad episode would be the owners of private medical colleges, who had already hiked their fees. 

He said that probe by NAB and FIA had already shown that there was no paper leak, and only one or two questions were from outside the course, which, he argued, was not a valid reason to cancel the whole test altogether. 

He accused the government of Sindh of promoting corruption instead of merit and transparency. He vowed that they would continue to raise voice for the rights of citizens, including students. 

Pasban leader Abdul Hakim Quaid, Sardar Zulfiqar, Muhammad Hamid Siddiqui, Saeed Rabanni, Tahir Azeem, Akram Agaria and others also spoke on the occasion. Separately, Pasban President Altaf Shakoor and Haziq Khursheed, a student, filed a constitutional petition number 7852/ 2017 in the Sindh High Court, praying to the court to declare the government notification dated 11/11/2017 for cancelling the NTS results for admissions in government-run medical colleges and universities as null and void. 

Making the province of Sindh through secretary health department, NTS through its CEO and Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) through its Chairman respondents, they submitted that the NTS was a reputed company, which provided services for conducting various examinations, tests, screening processes for the government and other institutions. 

The petitioners denied the allegations of entry paper leak. 

They prayed that petitioner Haziq Khursheed was entitled to be given admission in medical college/university in accordance with the result of the NTS entry test, and requested the apex court to declare that no fresh test was required. 

They also prayed to declare that the results of the entry test for MBBS and BDS for session 2017-18 are valid and liable to be acted upon. 

They requested the court to restrain the respondents or their agents from conducting any other entry test for MBBS and BDS Session 2017-18.