No PG Admission without MCI recognition: Ernakulam Medical College discontinues General medicine course

Ernakulam: Following the Kerala High Court's order that no admission should be made before arranging facilities as directed by the Medical Council of India (MCI), the Government Medical College, Ernakulam, has discontinued MD (general medicine) course for the current academic year.

With this, the medical institute has lost a total of 3 PG medical seats. The medical college authorities took the decision after it failed to get the recognition of the Medical Council of India (MCI) for the PG medical seats for the MD Medicine course.

The Medical College, in 2014, got permission from the MCI to begin the PG course in five streams. Eleven postgraduate seats were offered with three in general medicine and two each in paediatrics, psychiatry, pathology, and microbiology. The recognition was given on the condition that the medical college will fulfill all the stipulated criteria to run the course.

However, after the MCI inspection in 2017, none of the PG courses received recognition from the MCI due to major deficiencies found in infrastructure and faculty.

The MCI found a shortage of an associate professor and an assistant professor in general medicine.

A compliance report was sent by the State's Medical Education Directorate for the departments of paediatrics, psychiatry, and pathology, running in the institution.

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Dr V K Sreekala, the Principal, informed the Hindu that the lack of an MRI scanning machine was the main reason for withholding recognition at the time of the inspection. The medical college would soon have the MRI facility as the work towards installing the machine was nearing completion.

Apparently, the first batch of PG medical students who passed out from the said medical college approached the Kerala High Court against the denial of recognition to their degree by MCI.

The HC had ordered the medical college to make no admission to the seats until it gets recognition by the MCI following which Ernakulam Medical College decided to discontinue the course from this year.

The Principal told the TOI, "In its verdict, the court ordered that no admission should be made before arranging facilities suggested by the MCI. So, we couldn't admit new students this year."

"We have already written to the government to sanction more faculty posts as mandated by the MCI. The government is yet to create the posts," she added.