Due to a shortage of doctors in Meghalaya, Health Minister Ampareen Lyngdoh today informed that the government will revisit the bond policy and also ensure that it has more teeth.
Medical students who gain seats under the Meghalaya quota are meant to serve the state for a period of years as part of the bond they enter into with the state government. However, many try and weasel their way out of the requirement as private jobs are more lucrative or to get out of postings in rural areas.
Lyngdoh said that candidates will not be able to so easily pay to get out of the bond.
“It would be in the fitness of things to revisit this policy,” she said, adding that the Law Department will take a look at it. “Whatever decisions we take are workable, doable and will get done.”
The minister added that the policy needs to have teeth and the government needs to be able to hold individuals who have benefitted from this allocation of seats and ensure they come back to the state.
“We will now have to take the next step of action – after you serve a notice you’re supposed to give them a legal notice and subsequently file action against such individuals who have not informed the state government about their whereabouts. I’ve been informed that the government has attended to this problem but have not come forward to take punitive action. When you’ve signed a bond with the state government after you’ve been allocated a seat, the bond itself gives us legal justification to question why you’re not returning [to the state],” she said. “And we will change this now, where we will say that it’s not the money that you’re going to be evaluated on, it’s about strict adherence to the bond. You come and serve for five years, or eight or 12 years, and then we can review the payment of a bond in lieu of your unwillingness to return to the state.”
The minister also mentioned that of late, certain states are insisting that students from Meghalaya studying in those states sign a bond with them and not with the Meghalaya government. “So, we’re glad that the Medical Council has been formed in the state, which is now an authority for registration,” Lyngdoh said.
Earlier, she also met a delegation from the Khasi Students Union, which had sought her intervention in the transparency of allotment of medical seats under the state quota.
Lyngdoh informed that there has been a proportionate increase in the medical seats allocated to Meghalaya and it totalled 94 in 2023.
“We are having some observations that are pertinent to the shortage of doctors in Meghalaya. So alongside this allotment of seats by the government of India, the KSU and I had a discussion on the status of medical colleges,” she said. “Yes, both the medical colleges along with a third medical college, which is the Byrnihat institute of USTM, are progressing very well.”
However, consultations are required in the matter of doctor retirement age. State doctors retire like other government employees. “There is an urgent need to review this, especially for the doctors who are going to be engaged in the teaching profession,” Lyngdoh said.
