Non-MBBS teachers seek rollback of recruitment guidelines

The norms could result in loss of jobs for students currently pursuing the medical M.Sc courses, says Sridhar Rao

The association of non-MBBS teachers has asked the National Medical Commission (NMC) to roll back guidelines that seek to phase out their services in paraclinical specialities such as pharmacology and microbiology.

The new guidelines, issued by the NMC, also seek to reduce the intake of non-MBBS teachers to 15% of the total strength for the disciplines of Anatomy, Physiology and biochemistry.

“The amended guidelines are to be applicable on new medical colleges that start MBBS 2021 batch, any medical college that seeks enhancement of MBBS seats and all new appointments made in medical colleges,” Sridhar Rao, President of the National M.Sc Medical Teachers Association (NMMTA) said in a statement.

He said the changes would result in complete loss of jobs to the students currently pursuing the medical M.Sc courses.

According to Rao, services of non-medical teachers of colleges that seek to increase MBBS seats could be terminated and those employed would be unable to change jobs and remain stuck in the same institution till they retire, are forced to resign or terminated from service.

The NMMTA has asked the National Medical Commission to restore the previous norms or do away with ceilings on recruiting non-MBBS teachers and allow institutions to do their own selection.

There are about 6,000 non-medical teachers employed in various medical colleges.

The medical M.Sc courses were introduced in the 1960s to address the shortage of teachers in non-clinical subjects – anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, pharmacology and microbiology of the MBBS curriculum.