In J&K, Don’t Count Students by Faith. It Shrinks the Campus and Is Wrong, Illegal
26 November 2025 | The Indian Express
The J&K unit of the BJP has joined the disturbing clamour being worked up by Sangh Parivar outfits for scrapping the admission list at the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Institute of Medical Excellence in Katra. That 42 of the 50 MBBS seats in its first batch have gone to candidates who are Muslim and belong to Kashmir is a problem, contend the Bajrang Dal and the VHP, because the institute is set up with (Hindu) donations to the Vaishno Devi shrine. They demand that the admissions be put on hold, “corrective” action taken, and admission norms reviewed. The real problem in Katra, however, is this —while the Vaishno Devi Shrine Board has done well to invest its considerable resources in setting up an institute of medical sciences, the new spaces it has opened up for the young in the region are in danger of being narrowed and overtaken by an old and cynical zero-sum politics. It is also a politics that goes against the constitutional letter and spirit…