Education, Careers & Professional News
Sign bond for govt medical seat
Source
Times Of India
Date
2005-04-07
Information
CET 2005 students seeking admissions to government medical colleges from this year may well be prepared to sign a bond to serve for two years in rural areas.
Every student who gets a government or merit seat in our colleges must adhere to this. Violation will attract Rs 2 lakh penalty. Since the government is spending so much on medical education, we feel students must pay back by serving at least for two years in medically neglected areas, health and family welfare minister N. Cheluvarayaswamy told The Times of India.
He has already written to the medical education department. Well amend the present rules and take it before the next cabinet meeting to implement it before the CET admissions begin, the minister said.
The move is aimed at addressing the acute shortage of doctors in rural hospitals, where general physicians double up as surgeons or specialists. This, despite the government offering incentives for health professionals to serve in medically neglected areas.
Interestingly, Comed-K too has welcomed the government move. Not just students in government colleges, but even those allotted seats in aided institutions by the government with subsidised fees must serve in rural areas, Comed-K secretary S. Kumar said.
Only the St. Johns Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore, now mandates every student doing MBBS with them sign a bond to serve compulsorily in a medically neglected area for two years. Violation attracts Rs 3-lakh penalty.
In the existing four government medical colleges, there are 480 seats. With six more colleges coming up this year, the number will go up to 600 seats.
Predictably, students are angry with the government move. How can the government force us to go to rural areas? Which profession is socially conscious? Is everyone paying back the government? they ask.
But the government would have none of it. When the government is paying for their education, the least they can do is to serve in our hospitals. They pay only one-third of the fees to us, is the governments argument.