It has been reported that there is provision in the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill for regulating fee for 50% seats in private medical colleges and colleges under deemed universities. Students should be admitted to these 50% seats in government fee.

However, the Central government has hitherto not taken steps to ensure that deserving students whose rank is higher in the NEET PG2018 merit list get admission for MD/MS courses in medical colleges under deemed universities in these seats.

The PG seats in the medical colleges under deemed universities still remain beyond the reach of financially-backwards meritorious students in the absence of fee regulation.

As the Central government has failed to appoint a fee regulatory committee at the national level to regulate fee for courses in the medical colleges under the deemed universities, fee for the PG courses for 2018 in these colleges remains prohibitively high.

As a result less meritorious students pay their way into these colleges, depriving seats to the deserving ones. The fee for the PG medical clinical courses in these medical colleges ranges betweenRs 19 to 50 lakh per year.

Astonishingly, one of the colleges, Sri Ramachandra Medical College and Research Institute, Chennai has fixed a high monthly hostel fee of Rs 2 lakh.

As per the medical counselling committee website, the annual fees for different medical colleges under deemed varsities are: Hamdard Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi – MS Anatomy and MD Community Medicine-Rs 11 lakh and MD Pathology-Rs 20 lakh, M.M.

Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Mullana, Ambala, Haryana – Rs 29.95 lakh, SBKS Medical College and Research Centre, Vadodara, Gujarat – Rs 24.50 lakh, Kasturba Medical College Manipal, Karnataka – Rs 24.41 lakh, JSS Medical College, Mysure- Rs 23.12 lakh, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Belgavi, Karnataka- Rs 25 lakh, SDU Medical College, Kolar, Karnataka – Rs 25 lakh, K S Hegde Medical Academy, Mangaluru- Rs 28.08 lakh, Yenepoya Medical College, Mangaluru – Rs 30 lakh, Sri Sidhartha Medical College, Tumkur, Karnataka – Rs 22 lakh, Sri BM Patil Medical College, Vijayapura, Karnataka -Rs 34 lakh; Amrita Institute of Medical Science, Kochi-Rs 28 lakh, Krishna Institute of Medical Sciences, Karad, Maharashtra – Rs 24 lakh, BharatiVidyapeeth Medical College, Pune -Rs 28 lakh, BVDU Medical College, Sangli, Maharashtra – Rs 22 lakh, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Wardha, Maharashtra – Rs 31.70 lakh; MGM Medical College, Aurangabad and Navi Mumbai – Rs 25 lakh.

In order to curb prohibitive fees fixed by the medical colleges run by private deemed universities, the Madras High Court in June 2017, had directed the UGC and HRD ministry to set up a committee to regulate the rate of fees for MBBS, MD, MS and other courses offered by these institutions. The fee structure shows that orders of the high court have not been implemented by the UGC and HRD ministry

“The fee structure fixed by the deemed universities reflects the fact that the PG courses in the medical colleges under the deemed universities will go the rich way. The Central government should take immediate steps to regulate the fee announced by the universities, in order to ensure that deserving students get access to PG medical courses,” said a student, who has a reasonably high rank in NEET PG list.