Santosh Medical College: 5 rooms,board member who says a lecture his only link

• The Santosh University was set up by the Maharaji Educational Trust instituted by Dr P Mahalingam from Chennai. He was personal physician to BSP founder Kanshiram and the medical college was set up in Ghaziabad in 1996.

• The college operated from five Ghaziabad Development Authority flats for a while. The college still retains flats to accommodate the administrative office and the student hostel.

• The institute is recognised by the Medical Council of India for 50 MBBS seats,permitted to be renewed to 100 for 2009-10. The university website says it is looking at coordinating educational alliances and other programmes with Harvard Medical University to design,develop new medical schools and integrated academic health care centres.

• Its Board of Advisors has names of foreigners. But The Indian Express found that the only association that Dr Tetsuo Kanno of the Fujita Health University in Toyoake,Japan had with the institute was a lecture he delivered some years ago. I have had no communication with Santosh Medical College for a long time. I remember for 30 min or 1 hour more than 5-6 years ago. Thats all… I gave a lecture about neurosurgery. That is all what I did for them, Dr Tetsuo Kanno said in an email to The Indian Express.

• Mention of another board member,Dr Hidezo Yoshizawa,M.D.,Ph.D. Chairman and Prof. of Orthopaedic Surgery,Fujita Health University,cannot be found anywhere on the website of the Fujita Health University which incidentally also does not mention any department for orthopaedic surgery.

• Dr Eli A Friedman and Dr Joseph N Cunningham,listed as advisors,do not mention any association with Santosh Medical College on their web pages. They did not respond to email queries.

• Despite HRD Minister Kapil Sibals instruction that all deemed universities come up with a comprehensive,informative website to ensure transparency,Santosh Medical College stays mum on the parameters,be it faculty,students,fee etc.

* Dr Ayyadura,CEO of Santosh University and MD Community Medicine who heads the administrative office operating out of a flat,refused to answer queries on the number of enrolled students or allow a campus visit. He referred this reporter to Dr Mahalingam who despite repeated attempts was not available for comment.

* Dr Mahalingams trust runs four others colleges in Chennai Sharmila College of Nursing,Santosh College of Occupational Therapy,Maharaji College of Physiotherapy and Maharaji College of Pharmacy.

* In January 2009,the MCI rejected the college application for PG courses in anatomy,radio diagnosis,skin and VD.