Medical Council of India's tough moves make private medical colleges fume
Hyderabad: Private medical colleges are furious with the Medical Council of India for rejecting approvals on “frivolous grounds” leading to a severe shortage of MBBS seats in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
They said the investment of nearly Rs 400 crore made by them to set up a college and the Rs 70 crore recurring expenditure every year, were going down the drain, with the Medical Council of India rejecting permissions and renewals for new and old colleges citing “minor deficiencies”.
Even the seats in existing private colleges have been cut significantly this year. They have decided to move the Supreme Court against the MCI over the issue.
Last year, the MCI had restored 500 seats in private colleges after they moved the SC. The MCI’s decision has resulted in a loss of over 12,000 MBBS seats across the country this year.
AP and TS alone lost nearly 1,500 seats. This is contrary to the Centre’s policy of setting up 500 new medical colleges in the country to improve the doctor-public ratio to 1:1000 by 2028.
Even though the UPA government offered 75 per cent grant to states to set up new colleges, none came forward as they could not afford the operational expenditure.
“MCI teams come for inspections like CBI, I-T teams. They say there are only 100 patients or a few doctors in the college and attached hospital at the time of their visit without taking into consideration the records of day-to-day functioning. Except for major surgeries no one stays in hospitals for weeks and months. Patients are being discharged in a day or two for most diseases now,” said the owner of a medical college in AP.
Another deficiency pertains to faculty. “For instance, in the anatomy department, the MCI wants one professor, two associate professors, three assistant professors and four tutors. These norms were made way back in the 1950s. They are no longer relevant now with colleges using advanced technology for conducting virtual classes. But MCI denies approvals on these grounds,” said a college owner in Telangana.
