Rural medical course gets thumbs up -Governance Now

Rural medical course gets thumbs up

Vice-chancellors of medical colleges and health secretaries from states give their approval to the rural medical education course

Sonal Matharu | February 5, 2010

MCI chairman Ketan Desai (L) at a conference on the proposed rural medicine course

The proposed rural medical education course received an unanimous approval from vice-chancellors of medical colleges and state officials attending a workshop organised by the Medical Council of India (MCI). MCI chairman Ketan Desai said this at a press conference at the end of the two-day workshop on 'alternative model of undergraduate medical education' in New Delhi on Friday.

Clearing doubts expressed by doctors from Kerala who protested on the first day of the workshop, Desai said, “This course is in no way designed to degrade the medical profession and is not going to replace anybody.”

At the workshop it was decided that the course be called "bachelor of rural healthcare" instead of "bachelor of rural medicine and surgery", since the graduates would not be allowed to do surgery.

“The infrastructure at the sub-centres is limited. Surgery and super-speciality will not be taught in this course because the graduates will not have the required infrastructure at those hospitals,” said Desai.

He further added that the rural medical graduates would not under any circumstances be allowed to practice in the urban areas. Nor would they be allowed to sit for post-graduation exams and be at par with the MBBS doctors.

Students graduating from this course will be allowed to serve only in the rural areas of the district college they graduate from. Incase there are not enough students from one district, students from the neighbouring district can apply.

Once approved by the health ministry, the model of the course will be sent to states.

Each district will be allotted Rs 20 crore under the National Rural Health Mission for setting up medical colleges for the rural medical education course.

Comments

Other News

Maharashtra adopts hybrid model for Census 2026 data collection

The government has initiated preparations for Census 2026 in Maharashtra, introducing a hybrid approach that combines optional self-enumeration with comprehensive door-to-door data collection to ensure complete coverage across the state. According to senior officials, the Self-

What the nine Indian Nobel winners have in common

A Touch Of Genius: The Wisdom of India’s Nobel Laureates Edited by Rudrangshu Mukherjee Aleph Books, Rs 1499, 848 pages

Income Tax dept holds Ghatkopar Outreach on new IT Act

The Income Tax Department organised an outreach programme in Ghatkopar, Mumbai, to raise awareness about the key features of the Income Tax Act, 2025, effective April 1, 2026. The initiative is part of a nationwide effort to promote taxpayer awareness, simplify compliance, and strengthen a transparent, eff

Making AI work where governance is closest to people

India’s next governance leap may not solely come from digitisation. It will come from making public systems more intelligent, more adaptive, and more responsive to the dynamics at the grassroots. That opportunity is especially significant at the panchayat level, where governance is not an abstract po

Borrowing troubles: How small loans are quietly trapping youth

A silent crisis is playing out in the pocket of young India, not in stock markets or government treasuries, but in smartphones of college students and first-jobbers who clicked on the Apply Now button without reading the small print. A decade ago, to take a loan, you had to do some paperwor