A senior faculty member of IIM-A, at the request of the health ministry, has spoken to all the four boards at NMC—the Undergraduate Medical Education Board (UGMEB), Postgraduate Medical Education Board (PGMEB), Ethics and Medical Registration Board (EMRB) and Medical Assessment Rating Board (MARB), and has prepared a report on how to improve the NMC’s day-to-day-functioning and address the challenges.
The new plan could involve appointing individual secretaries for each of the four boards.
“A committee has been constituted by the government, and they invited IIM-A to study the gaps in the functioning of the NMC. Some major improvements may be seen in the NMC structure and certain changes may also be seen in the NMC Act. There is also a plan to have secretaries for each of the four different boards,” said the first of the three officials cited earlier, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity. However, the plan is not final and is still under consideration, the official added.
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The move follows a Mint report in September about the internal crisis at NMC, with its four autonomous boards working at cross purposes. Right now, the commission has only one secretary who is responsible for leading the NMC and ensuring that it functions effectively.
“Once these secretaries for all the four boards are appointed, then these boards will have uniformity and have to play roles as it is defined in the NMC Act. In the past, these boards have been working in silos and reluctant to share any information with the NMC leadership. The goal is only to improve the functioning of the commission, address gaps so as to strengthen the quality and standard of medical education in the country,” the official said.
Queries sent to the health ministry secretary and spokesperson remained unanswered till press time.
Over the years, India’s medical education network has expanded multi-fold with more focus and investments towards professional education and quality. The focus of the government has been on reaching the underserved areas and addressing the lack of accessibility.
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Meanwhile, the central government has increased the number of medical colleges and subsequently increased MBBS seats. The number of medical colleges grew from 499 in FY19 to 780 in FY25, while MBBS seats increased from 70,012 in FY19 to 1,18,137 in FY25. The Postgraduate medical seats grew from 39,583 in FY19 to 73,157 in FY25.
There are 13.86 lakh registered allopathic doctors as of July 2024, with a current ratio of 1:1,263 per person. The WHO norm of one doctor per 1,000 persons could be met by 2030 with an annual increase of 50,000 doctors.
“Last year, the health ministry had sent a senior faculty member from IIM-A to NMC. The faculty member interacted with each of the four boards about their day-to-day activities and prepared a report…,” said a second official who recently got relieved from NMC.
“One of the major concerns which was expressed by all the boards was shortage of manpower in the NMC and political interventions,” the official added.
The third former NMC official said that that the IIM-A faculty member stayed at NMC for 2-3 days and spoke to individual boards and took inputs. “Largely, the boards highlighted their scope of work and challenges they are facing.”
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Meanwhile, the government has also floated an advertisement to seek applications for the posts of president, secretary and members of NMC, and key positions in the four boards under the NMC. According to the NMC website, 6 keys posts are vacant as of now.
Recently, health minister J.P. Nadda told reporters that the government is working on getting new recruitments completed at NMC.
The NMC was created by a government notification on 24 September 2020, and is a statutory body constituted after the abolition of the Medical Council of India. The functions of the NMC include improving access to quality and affordable medical education, ensuring availability of adequate and skilled doctors and ensuring prompt decision-making to improve the quality of medical education. The four boards were envisaged to achieve these objectives, functioning independently with well-defined powers and responsibilities.
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