The government has found a novel way for infrastructure to catch up with the budget announcement about the 75,000 medical seats to be added across the country over the next five years – by diluting the quality of faculty.
Speaking on her government’s efforts at expanding medical education, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her budget speech, had said, “Our government has added almost 1.1 lakh UG and PG seats in 10 years, an increase of 130%. Next year, 10,000 additional seats will be added in medical colleges and hospitals towards the goal of adding 75,000 seats in the next five years.”
The policy decision is a reiteration of an announcement made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his Independence Day speech last year. “Nearly 25,000 youngsters go abroad for medical education, and they are having to go to such places that astonishes me,” he’d said.
Teaching eligibility diluted
Experts say these seats are being increased without a commensurate increase in faculty and infrastructure. It is keeping this shortage of faculty in mind, perhaps, that the National Medical Commission relaxed norms for faculty appointments in a draft notification issued two weeks ago.
Now non teaching consultants, working for at least four years in a government hospital, and diploma holders working as medical officers for six years in government medical colleges, shall be eligible to become an assistant professor, the new guidelines on Teachers Eligibility Qualification say.
According to the existing criteria, an assistant professor can be recruited only if they have an MD/MS in the given speciality recognised by the NMC. The number of research papers required for promotion of assistant professor and associate professor has been reduced from four to two.
“The faculty eligibility relaxations – one of which would effectively allow doctors who have never produced a thesis to guide students into generating a thesis – would adversely impact the quality of education that medical students receive,” says a doctor.
Also read: Health Budget: How Closer Scrutiny of Major Announcements Reveals Half-Baked Truths
“Where will the faculty come from,” says another academician. “If seats have grown by 130%, has there been a commensurate increase of 130% in the faculty as well?,” he asks. “There was sufficient faculty for 357 medical colleges for UG courses in 2014. Now the gap has grown with the shortage being as much as two third,” he added.
“The NMC proposals relaxing the requirements for faculty appointments appear aligned with this plan to add 75,000 seats,” said Kabir Sardana, professor of dermatology at the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Medical Sciences and Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, New Delhi.
Zero attendance of medical faculty
A parliamentary standing committee report on health tabled in February last year has also pointed out that the government’s efforts to increase the number of medical colleges and seats has resulted “an alarming shortage of faculty members”. A premier institute like All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi is short by one third of its sanctioned strength, the report says.
In fact, there was zero attendance of faculty in most of 246 medical colleges that were assessed by the National Medical Commission in 2022-23. “Most of the colleges had either ghost faculty or senior residents or had yet to employ the required faculty at all. While none of the institutes met the minimum 50% attendance requirement, zero attendance of faculty was common in most of the medical colleges,” the standing committee report says.
The NMC boasts of a doctor patient ratio of 1:856 but forgets to mention that 80% of them are concentrated in urban areas. The additional 75,000 seats would add to the glut.
There are 702 medical colleges in the country against 387 in 2013-14, a hike of 81%. And the number of MBBS aspirants who appeared for the NEET UG test 2023 was over 20 lakh, of which over 11 lakh students qualified for the 1.08 lakh seats.
Of these, about 54,000 seats are government colleges and the rest are private. Maheshwar Peri, founder of Careers 360 asks why 11 lakh students are allowed to qualify when there are only one lakh seats.
The fee structure of private versus government colleges is a clear giveaway. For a five year UG course, the difference is about Rs 1.25 crore versus Rs 62 lakh. The bar for passing is kept as low as 16% (2022) to 22% (2024). NEET creates meritocracy, he says. “The seats increase should happen in public institutes so everyone can benefit,” he adds.
