MBBS Semester Exam: NBMCH toilets become seats for textbooks, notes

Siliguri: The North Bengal Medical College and Hospital (NBMCH) authorities faced an embarrassing situation when copying material in the form of notes and textbook pages were discovered on the toilet seat of washrooms adjacent to the examination halls, with a simultaneous Medical Council of India inspection on for infrastructural compliance. An MBBS 3rd prof semester exam was on in the examination halls, in whose bathrooms the copying material was discovered.The only saving grace was that this material was not laid hands on by the inspecting MCI officials, but the authorities themselves.

Students are being suspected of having placed the study material in the toilets, in order to facilitate copying during the Third Prof Examination (Part 11) that is underway. 102 doctors appeared in the Medicine and Gynaecology exam, on Monday, the day the copying material was discovered in the men's toilet.

"We keep a strong vigil of the exam halls.Someone may have kept those things in the toilets after failing to carry them to the examination hall," said Assistant Dean, Students' Affairs, NBMCH, Dr Sandip Sengupta to the Statesman.

The Council officials were not the actual discoverers of the material in the bathrooms. However, during their course of observations, they brought the lack of CCTV surveillance in the exam halls to the notice of the college authorities. Dr. Sengupta however, reassured that installation of CCTV cameras would be done inside the exam halls, shortly, along with mobile jammers.

The Council's inspection team visiting the college for a day-long inspection included Professor General Medicine, Smt NHL Municipal Medical College, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Dr Jayesh Dutt, Professor and Head of Obstetrics and Gynecology, GMERS Medical College, Gandhinagar, Gujarat, Bipin M Nayak.

The team was at the college to review the process of conducting the MBBS examination, evaluate examination performance in the past three years, along with the timing of the examinations, faculty strength, and also assess whether Council norms were being followed during the examinations conducted.

The college had lost 50 of its 150 MBBS seats last term(2017-18), due to prevailing infrastructural deficiencies.