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A plea to regulate fees of private medical colleges was made in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday with Congress leader Jairam Ramesh also calling for increasing the number of government medical colleges.
Raising the issue through a Zero Hour mention, he said just about 53 per cent of all medical institutions in the country are government colleges and the rest are private whose population has been increasing over the last few years.
The government, he said, came up with the NMC Bill in 2017 that provided for National Medical Commission to regulate fees and all other charges for not more than 40 per cent seats in private medical colleges.
The Standing Committee changed it to at least 50 per cent. But the Act passed by the Parliament in 2019 changed at least 50 per cent to 50 per cent, he said, highlighting the high fees charged by private medical colleges on seats outside the NMC purview.
"We must increase the population of government medical colleges (and) we must strictly regulate the fees of all medical institutions including private institutions," he said.
The fee policy currently is to 'pay now learn later' but it should be 'learn now pay later', he said.
"There is an acute shortage of medical doctors and public health professionals in this country," he said.
"The belief that private medical education will form the foundation of medical education in this country is deeply, deeply flawed and deeply dangerous," he stressed.
Jaya Bachchan (SP) raised the issue of continuing manual scavenging in parts of the country saying lack of proper rehabilitation is driving scavengers to again take up manual scavenging as a profession.
Associating himself with the issue, Tiruchi Siva (DMK) demanded stringent action against contractors engaging manual scavengers to clean drainages and proper rehabilitation of manual scavengers.
Narendra Jadhav (Nominated) raised the issue of overcrowded, unhygienic conditions of widows' homes in Vrindavan saying such homes lack basic amenities.
The inmates do not have access to social welfare schemes and are denied property rights due to illiteracy.
He demanded that the government restore the property rights of widows and ensure better implementation of social welfare schemes for widows.
V Vijayasai Reddy raised the issue of the increasing tendency to hire teachers on a contract basis saying just ad-hoc appointments do not provide service benefits, and job security and often are paid lower wages.
Stating that it was becoming difficult to attract teachers due to declining teacher welfare measures, he said the government must regularise the employment of contract teachers.
Ajay Pratap Singh (BJP) wanted a special package for developing 250 places where Lord Ram is believed to have spent time as well as the route of Narmada River parikrama.