The controversy over the allocation of 42 out of 50 seats to Muslim students at the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board (SMVDSB)-run medical college has escalated sharply, with more than 60 organisations backed by the Sangh Parivar forming an amalgamation and planning a large-scale agitation to scrap the admissions.

At present, admission to the MBBS programme at the college is based on merit secured in the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET).

The new body, ‘Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Sangharsh Samiti’, under the umbrella of the Shri Sanatan Dharam Sabha, has been formed on the lines of the ‘Shri Amarnath Sangharsh Samiti’, which led the agitation in 2008 against the revocation of forest land transfer to the Amarnath cave shrine in Kashmir. Jammu region had come to a standstill for

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