MBBS fees in private colleges may be reduced by up to 90%

The Union Health Ministry has asked National Medical Commission (NMC) to prepare a draft  for the new fee structure in private medical colleges and deemed universities for the next academic session.

The Board of Governors (BoG), who has been given the task to design new fee structure, is considering cutting fees for half of graduate and post-graduate seats by 70 per cent and 90 per cent, respectively. According to the news agency PTI, with this reduction planned by BoG, the fee for 50 per cent of MBBS seats will range between Rs 6 lakh to Rs 10 lakh in across private medical colleges.

At present, an ordinary medical student pays a fee of Rs 25 lakh annually in Maharashtra and Delhi. Whereas, a student pays Rs 1 crore to Rs 3 crore to complete a three year post-graduation course in a private medical college.

Meanwhile, the ministry has asked private medical and dental colleges across the country to charge fee for only the first year from students at the time of admission.

At present, some states regulate fees of seats in private colleges through MoUs signed with college managements.

In addition, the Supreme Court has set up committees to fix fees in private colleges as an interim measure. Deemed to be Universities claim they are not covered by these committees.

Nearly 50 per cent of total MBBS seats in the country are in government colleges, which have nominal fees. Of the remaining seats, 50 per cent would be regulated by NMC.

This means that almost 75 per cent of total seats in the country would be available at reasonable fees. In the spirit of federalism, the state governments would still have the liberty to decide fees for remaining seats in private medical colleges on the basis of individual MOUs signed with colleges on the basis of mutual agreement, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has earlier said.

The NMC Act, which seeks to usher in mega reforms in the medical education sector, received the assent of the President on August 8 and was notified the same day.

The Act provides for setting up of an NMC in place of the Medical Council of India for development and regulation of all aspects of medical education, profession and institutions.

The BoG is learnt to have held consultations with states and sought their suggestions for framing draft guidelines for the fee structure.

The Board of Governors has been requested to prepare draft guidelines for fee regulation so that it can be used as a base document by NMC, a senior Health Ministry official said.

The President had dissolved the Medical Council of India (MCI) in 2018 and a BoG was appointed to perform its functions.

The Clause 1 of sub-section (1) of section 10 of the National Medical Commission Act 2019, empowers the Commission to frame guidelines for determination of fees and all other charges in respect of 50 per cent of seats in private medical institutions and deemed to be universities government under the NMC Act 2019.

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(With PTI inputs)