Out of 262 medical colleges in the country, 60 odd, both private and Government, have not been issued certificates of continuance by the Medical Council of India (MCI), after the council members found deficiencies in terms of aspects like infrastructure and teaching faculty in these colleges.

The report enlisting the names of the medical colleges was sent to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare last week.

The MCI officials disclosed that Government colleges like Vellore Medical College, Theni Medical College in Tamil Nadu, Shimoga Medical College in Karnataka, Kanyakumari Medical College and Government Medical Colleges in Hassan, Belgaon and Mandia have not received permission from the MCI to continue.

Seventy per cent of the affected colleges are situated in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharastra, a few are from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and other states. The private medical colleges which could not prove fit to continue after evaluation include: Sharda New college in Noida, Guru Ram Rai in Dehradun, Muzaffar Nagar College and Santosh Medical College in Ghaziabad.

“We have written about the problems we found in these medical colleges, defining why these colleges should not be given permission to continue. The inspection was completed on June 15 and the report was sent to the Government thereafter,” said a senior official in the MCI.

Of the 60 colleges under the scanner, 10 were new medical colleges, 35-40 failed the renewal inspection, 3-5 were not recognised, five others were issued negative status for continuing further.

The Health Ministry officials said they are still discussing the recommendations of the MCI and will soon declare the list. The acceptance of the recommendations by the Ministry will clearly mean decrease of medical seats. Giving recognition to a college to continue is however a lengthy process.

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