Delhi HC raises concerns over lack of 'quality, affordable' medical colleges in country

New Delhi [India], March 16 (ANI): The Delhi High Court on Wednesday said the lack of medical institutions providing quality and affordable education often compel aspiring students to pursue their studies abroad. The observation came while hearing the matter of a medical institute seeking an increase in the number of seats.
Justice Rekha Palli's remarks came in an order passed on March 15, 2022, in a matter where the National Medical Commission rejected the petitioners' request for grant of permission for an increase of seats in a college in the Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) course as also in post-graduate courses of MS (Obstetrics and Gynaecology) and MS (Orthopaedics).
Court said, "This reality has especially become a cause of concern at a time when due to the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, several thousand Indian medical students, who had gone to pursue their medical education in the now war-hit Ukraine have been rescued and brought home, have also lost their seats in medical colleges."
Justice Rekha Palli while deciding the matter said, keeping in view that there is no deficiency in the infrastructure of the petitioner institute, coupled with the fact that the deficiency in clinical material, found during the initial inspections, also stood rectified in the inspection held in November 2021, this Court, instead of remanding the matter back to the respondents for a fresh inspection, is inclined to direct the respondents to grant permission to the petitioner institute on the basis of the said inspection report and to increase the seats from 4 to 7 in MS (Obstetrics and Gynaecology), from 3 to 7 in MS (Orthopaedics), and from 100-150 in the MBBS course at the petitioner institute.
Court also said that no doubt the respondents cannot be asked to lower the standards prescribed under the regulations however, simultaneously, in a situation like the present, when it is found that an institute like the petitioner which has been running for the last more than 20 years is not lacking in any infrastructure and has also rectified the deficiencies which were found at the time of initial inspections, that too when the said deficiencies were only on account of the COVID pandemic, it would also be against the public interest to deny permission to the petitioner to increase the seats.
At a time when the ratio of the medical profession as vis-a-vis the population of the country is abysmally low, an increase in the number of PG and UG seats would certainly contribute to the bigger goal of strengthening the medical infrastructure of the country, the court said. (ANI)