The National Medical Commission (NMC), the primary Indian regulatory body that regulates medical education and medical professionals, has deemed conversion therapy as “professional misconduct”. Conversion therapy is an illegal practice that members of the LGBTQIA+ community are subjected to, often by their families and religious institutions, in a bid to ‘cure’ them of their sexual orientation or gender.
Though the NMC had earlier told the Madras High Court that the practice is illegal and amounts to professional misconduct, while the court was hearing a plea by a lesbian couple in Chennai seeking protection from police harassment, the regulatory body issued an official order to this effect only recently on August 25. The order, which is addressed to all State Medical Councils, has been undersigned by CL Guleria, Deputy Secretary (Ethics), Ethics and Medical Registration Board. Guleria has stated in the order that the NMC “has decided that conversion therapy will constitute a professional misconduct under the Indian Medical Council (Professional Misconduct, Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2002”.
The Madras HC had also previously noted an expert committee recommendation to identify “conversion therapy” as a professional misconduct. “The National Medical Council, on the basis of the recommendations made by the expert committee, through their communication dated 15.02.2022, has specifically directed the National Medical Council - Ethics and Medical Registration Board to take action wherever such ‘conversion therapies’ are undertaken by any medical professional,” the court had said.
Further, an expert committee formed by the Undergraduate Medical Education Board to address issues faced by the LGBTQIA+ community had also recommended making modifications to the Competency-Based Medical Education curriculum. Further, changes have also been made to the curriculum to highlight the “unscientific, inhuman and discriminatory nature” of the two-finger test.