29.4.2022, Thursday, New Delhi
Supreme Court Rescues MBBS Students Hit By Ukraine Crisis,
Pandemic, Asks NMC To Frame Scheme
Coming to the rescue of MBBS
students of foreign universities who faced difficulties due to the Ukraine
crisis and COVID, the Supreme Court Friday directed the National Medical
Commission (NMC) to frame a scheme in two months permitting students to
complete clinical training in medical colleges here. The top court, which was
hearing an appeal of the NMC against a Madras High Court order asking it to
provisionally register MBBS graduate of a Chinese University, however, was of
the view that there was nothing wrong in denying the provisional registration
as “without practical training, there cannot be any Doctor who is expected to
take care of the citizens of the country”.
A bench of justices Hemant
Gupta and V Ramasubramanian said, “No doubt, the pandemic has thrown new challenges
to the entire world including the students but granting provisional
registration to complete an internship to a student who has not undergone
clinical training would be compromising with the health of the citizens of any
country and the health infrastructure at large.” However, the top court took
note of the plight of the student who could not complete the clinical training
physically in the Chinese institute due to the pandemic situation and said that
talent should not be allowed to be wasted and services “should be used to
augment health infrastructure in the country”.
“We therefore direct to frame
a scheme as a one time measure within two months to allow the student and such
similarly situated students who have not actually completed clinical training
to undergo clinical training in India in the medical colleges which may be
identified by the appellant for a limited duration as may be specified by the
appellant, on such charges which the appellant determines,” Justice Hemant
Gupta, writing the judgement, said.
The 18-page verdict said that
it shall be open to the NMC, the successor organisation of MCI and which
supervises medical education in the country, to test such students in the
manner within the next one month, that it considers appropriate to satisfy that
they are sufficiently trained to be provisionally registered to complete an
internship for 12 months. The verdict examined the question of whether the
degree granted by a foreign institute even in respect of clinical training is
binding on the NMC and the student has to be provisionally registered.
“We find that the appellant
(NMC) is not bound to grant provisional registration to the student who has not
completed the entire duration of the course from the Foreign Institute
including the clinical training,” it said, adding that without practical
training, there cannot be any doctor and the decision of not to grant
provisional registration “cannot be said to be arbitrary”. The bench was very
critical of the submission of MBBS students like Pooja Thandu Naresh, who was
granted an MBBS degree by Qingdao University, Faculty of Medicine, China, that
certain similarly placed people have been granted provisional registration.
“This will not confer any
right with the student to claim provisional registration so as to undergo the
internship. There cannot be any equality in illegality,” the bench said. The
medical body had filed the appeal against the orders of July 29 and September
29, 2021, of the high court in the petitions, filed for quashing the circulars
issued by the Tamil Nadu Medical Council asking the student to undergo two
months of compulsory rotatory residential internship, followed by one year of
internship before granting permanent registration under the Indian Medical
Council Act, now repealed by the National Medical Commission Act, 2019.
The bench found force with the
submissions of the NMC that in terms of the statutory regulations, the student
has to study the medical course in the same institute located abroad for the
“entire duration”. “However, the fact remains that the students were permitted
to undergo medical courses abroad and that they have completed their curriculum
according to the certificate granted by such Foreign Institute. Therefore, such
national resources cannot be permitted to be wasted which will affect the lives
of young students, who had taken admission in the foreign Institutes as part of
their career prospects,” it said.
Therefore, the services of
the students should be used to augment the health infrastructure in the
country, and thus, it would be necessary that the students undergo actual
clinical training of such duration and at such institutes which are identified
by the NMC and on such terms and conditions, including the charges for
imparting such training, as may be notified by the medical body, it said.