‘Medical Council Amendment Act will increase black money circulation’

At a time when the Centre is keen on implementing Medical Council (Amendment) Act, 2016 to introduce exit examination for the MBBS doctors, a city doctor has written to the Prime Minister saying the new approach will indirectly increase the circulation of black money.

Dr AK Maity, a city based doctor in his letter to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking his intervention to conduct the national level entrance examination in two phases as it would reduce the alleged corruption in the medical admission.

The present system of admitting medical aspirants to various under graduate courses through a single examination based on multiple choice questions involves huge monetary transactions. It has been alleged that some people are securing medical admission against a huge amount of money. It is alleged that the bulk of the money is paid in cash leaving no trace of transaction. The government has failed to crack down on this black market that has been created over the prestigious medical admissions in the country.

Dr Maity viewed that the single examination system and the exit examination the government now proposes will never be able to stop the use of black money. The Centre through the Medical Council (Amendment) Act, 2016 is trying to introduce exit examination for doctors which means that a doctor after obtaining their under graduate medical degrees have to again to sit for the exit examination to start the medical practice. There is always a possibility of corruption in the proposed theory of exit examination. In his letter he urged the Prime Minister to take some steps so that the national level medical entrance examination is conducted in two phases ~ one paper will consist of short answer type question while the other paper will be descriptive.

It may be mentioned that to check the corruption and irregularities in the medical admission, retired Justice MSA Siddiqui committee has recommended two-phase medical entrance examination. The Centre is yet to implement it. After the SC order 2015, HRD Ministry appointed a committee headed by retired Justice MSA Siddiqui. The committee submitted its report to the Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry, suggesting conducting the All India Pre- Medical and Pre-Dental Test (AIPM/PDT) in two parts, 1st phase with Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) and 2nd phase Non-MCQs to check the possibility of any irregularity including question paper leaks.

“What is the problem in introducing two phases examination in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) while all important entrance exams like IIT, IAS, IPS, AFMC Pune, CMC Vellor etc are held in two phases,” Dr Maity asked.