Most med edu aspirants from Pune, Ahmednagar close 2nd

Mumbai: Pune has seen the largest cohort of 4,656 candidates aspiring to join medical education this year. With 4,045 aspirants, Ahmednagar is surprisingly a close second and Nagpur comes third with 3,672. If Mumbai and Mumbai suburban are added, though, they top the charts at 4,936.
Class 12 graduates who registered to participate in the medical and dental admission in Maharashtra saw another 1,116 out-of-state aspirants who would like to join medical schools in this state.While the CET cell has extended the deadline for registration to January 17, it merely expects the tally to go up by about 100-odd students. Experts say since the last five years, Mumbai students’ interest in professional education has been on the wane.
“Not only are the registration numbers high from Pune, we also see that students from there are topping the charts with regards to their scores in the past two years,” said Dr T P Lahane, former head of the Directorate of Medical Education and Research. Pune aced the charts ever since NEET was introduced in 2013 and Latur, the traditional topper, has slid from its pole position since then. Latur has 2,433 applicants for undergraduate medical and dental admissions.
Former DMER head Dr Pravin Shingare said Ahmednagar had never been so high up on the list.
“In recent past, after Pune, we would see the second largest numbers from Thane and Mumbai suburban. But now coaching centres from Kota have opened in Ahmednagar. Earlier, they would have sub-centres in Pune, Nagpur, Mumbai and Thane. And students from Ahmednagar used to come to these cities. But with the growing numbers, these coaching classes have started centres in Ahmednagar too,” reasoned Dr Shingare.
CET cell commissioner R S Jagtap said he noticed that aspirations of students from the interior pockets of the state were on the rise. “It is heartening to see that larger numbers from several corners of the state are opting for professional education, including medicine and dentistry,” said Jagtap.
A total of 59,647 candidates have, till date, registered for undergraduate admissions to health science courses, including MBBS and dental (BDS). In 2019, a total of 59,000 candidates had registered in Maharashtra and last year, a total of 64,645 candidates had signed up when registration counters closed. This year, there are nearly 6,800 UG medical seats across government and private medical colleges in the state.
This is the second extension by the CET cell. Online registration now will go on till January 17, 5pm. Meanwhile, registration fees can be paid from January 13-17. Documents can be uploaded from January 13 to 17. Candidates who had signed up earlier don’t need to register again.