Recently, The Supreme Court responded to the plight of Indian medical students who were unable to complete the clinical training of their foreign MBBS course due to the pandemic and the Ukraine-war situation and issued certain directives to the National Medical Commission.
The bench headed by Justices Hemant Gupta and V Ramasubramanian was hearing an appeal filed by the National Medical Commission against a Madras High Court order. The Madras HC allowed the provisional registration for a student who after the COVID-19 pandemic was unable to complete her MBBS clinical training in China.
Accordingly, The Court directed the NMC to develop a scheme as a one-time measure within two months to allow students who have not completed clinical training to undergo clinical training in India in medical colleges identified by the NMC for a limited duration as specified by it, on such fees as it determines.
Further, The Court also held that it will be open to the NMC to test the candidates in the scheme in the manner that it deems appropriate within the next one month in order to satisfy that such students are sufficiently trained to be provisionally registered to complete an internship for 12 months.
Further, The Court granted the appeal, holding that the NMC is not required to grant provisional registration to a student who has not completed clinical training. In the same petition, the Court issued the above-mentioned directives to the NMC in order to allay the fears of Indian students who were unable to complete the clinical training of the foreign courses.
The Court stated that the services of these students should be used to supplement the country’s health infrastructure. Accordingly, the NCM should allow them to complete actual clinical training at such institutes for as long as it sees fit.
