Maharashtra: DMER covering illegible teachers to save seats

Nagpur: The Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER), professes to be adhering strictly to the Medical Council of India's (MCI), promotion norms in Government Medical Colleges (GMCs). It has gone as far as revoking promotions of certain teachers, across the state on the basis, that they do not qualify, as per MCI norms. However, insiders claim, otherwise, saying that the process for promotions is not transparent and a clear bias prevails in the process.

A year and a half ago, the government had given ad hoc promotions to 212 medical teachers, in 16 medical colleges of the state. This was done to meet the Council's requirement of the number of faculty in each college. However, recently the MCI refused to recognize these teachers in their positions, if they did not math up to the stipulated Council requirement. One of the major requirement being- the number of publications by each teacher.

The Directorate of Medical Education, came across 21 such non qualified faculty that did not meet up to the MCI norms; be it in terms of the no of publications or teacher quality. The DMER however, exercised restraint by demoting only 8 of the 21, for fear of colleges losing their seats.

The DMER validates its own act saying that the others were promoted through the Maharashtra Public Service Commission(MPSC). "It is the responsibility of DMER to ensure these teachers too meet the norms. They cannot be ignored on such flimsy ground," said a senior GMCH teacher .

Director Dr Pravin Shingare told TOI the reason for his office not transferring or demoting other teachers was to protect enough number of undergraduate seats for the colleges, they are working in. "I cannot allow the loss of seats on account of these teachers. I am working on the issue and will shortly come out with some solution," he said.