Declare Vaishno Devi Medical College a Minority Institute if Muslims Aren’t Welcome: Omar | Kashmir Life

SRINAGAR: Chief Minister Omar Abdullah strongly criticized the objection raised by the JK Assembly’s Leader of the Opposition regarding the admission of students from a specific community to the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Institute of Medical Excellence.

He challenged those raising objections to grant the institute minority status if they opposed the current admission process based purely on merit.

Speaking to media persons in Nagrota, the CM Omar said, “You are right about faith. Then, when you were building the medical college, you should have given it the status of a minority institute. Why didn’t you give it? You should have given it, but you did not.”

Abdullah clarified that admission is determined solely on the NEET entrance test; it is not determined by religion. He added, “Now, if you don’t want Muslims to study in it, that is fine, sir. You declare it a minority institute, please do it.”

The controversy arose after the institute, which was sanctioned 50 MBBS seats this year, admitted 42 students from the Muslim community and one Sikh student in its first batch for the 2025-26 academic year, sparking demands from certain right-wing Hindu groups to change the institute’s status.

CM Abdullah warned against the sectarian approach, stating that rejecting Muslim children today would lead to blaming the entire community for their actions tomorrow. He pointed out the hypocrisy in questioning their choice of institutions.

“When the children got admission in the Faridabad University, then what did they ask? ‘Why do they go to such places? Why do they go to these places where they get radicalised?’ When children are willing to go to a medical college like Mata Vaishno Devi, they do not care about the name being Mata Vaishno Devi. They want to become doctors.”

He stressed the danger of denying them education based on religion, “Now you are denying them admission based on their religion. Tomorrow, if they go to some other institution where they get radicalised, will Sunil Sharma sahab then say he is at fault for this?”

CM Omar reiterated that when the bill to establish the institute was passed in the JK Assembly, the intention was to make it an institution of excellence based on merit, not a minority institution.

“Don’t treat Muslim children like this, because you blame the entire community for what happens next. Don’t do it. If you want Muslim children not to study in this medical college, please change its status, grant it minority status, and our children will get admission elsewhere: to Bangladesh, Turkey, or anywhere else,” the Chief Minister said. (KNC)