About 70 medical graduates have had a hard time for the past three months in Andhra Pradesh who completed their degrees abroad mainly from Central Asian countries due to uncertainty about getting their Permanent Registration (PR).
The candidates must sit for the Foreign Medical Graduate Examination (FMGE) after returning to India so as to get the PR. After counseling, internship at an allotted college follows. It is only upon completion of the internship that they are given their PR, which is a prerequisite for practicing or studying further in the country.
However, those 70-odd graduates who did their internships by May 2024 are still waiting for their PRs from the Andhra Pradesh Medical Council. These graduates belonged to the batch hit by coronavirus pandemic. Graduates have been protesting outside Dr NTR University of Health Sciences in Vijayawada.
When COVID-19 came up all foreign graduates returned home and finished up on line. After COVID-19 cases reduced, some returned back to universities while others didn’t.
“Those of us who went back got compensation certificates stating that we compensated for the lost offline sessions,” said Karthik (name changed), who prusued a six-year course at a recognised university in Kyrgyzstan from 2016 to 2022.
Accordingly, more than thirty thousand students such as Karthik took FMGE exam in December 2022. Out of them around three thousand passed it whereas three hundred and forty were from AP. Seventy students belonged to this category had been issued compensation certificates.
“The confusion arose because of two notifications issued by National Medical Commission on June 7 and June17. The first notification said foreign medical graduates need to undergo a two-year internship as they attended their classes online. This is discrimination against us. Even those studied in the country also attended their classes online. When we raised our voice, NMC withdrew its notification and released another saying that those having compensation certificates could do one year internship whereas others were required to do two years,” explained Karthik.
However, these 70 odd medical graduates after completing their internship in May 2024 faced a big shock when they were told that they needed to undergo another year of internship. Asked about it, A.P. Medical Council Registrar I. Ramesh said, “How can they compensate for, say nine months of classes in a less duration? There needs to be clarification on this from the NMC.”
The students pointed out to officials that while their batchmates from other States had received their PRs immediately it was only in AP there was a delay. Dr. Ramesh said being a Registrar he couldn’t take decisions as it was the council members’ job.
According to information, all members of the council resigned in June and new ones are yet to be nominated by the state government. Meanwhile, the fate of medical graduates still hangs in balance for having undertaken NEET exam on August 11.
The results are coming soon. We are getting more and more anxious about this. PRs should be in place by the time of counseling us. We have already wasted three months, why should we lose an entire year? Another anonymous graduate asked, “Why do we go through so many hoops to get a PR?”
According to them, even a month’s stipend was not given to them as interns. “Dr. Ramesh has assured that the students would get PRs before exam results come out,” said one of the graduates who is so far staying in Vijayawada till there is clarity.
