MCI dissolved, NMC takes charge as top medical education regulator in India

The government has dissolved the Medical Council of India (MCI) following the corruption charges in 2010 and it was replaced in 2018 with a Board of Governors (BoG), MCI. Now, the Centre has dissolved the BoG through a gazette notification. The National Medical Commission (NMC), a new body, will function as the county’s top regulator of medical education. The setting up of NMC was a government move to bring reforms in the medical education sector, by replacing the MCI. “Indian Medical Council Act, 1956 (102 of 1956) is hereby repealed with effect from 25 September. The BoG appointed under Section3A of the Medical Council Act, 1956 (102 of 1956) in supersession of the MCI constituted under subsection (1) of Section 3 of the said Act shall stand dissolved,” stated the gazette notification issued by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoH&FW).

 The chairman of the NMC for three years would be Dr Suresh Chandra Sharma, who is retired HoD of AIIMS, New Delhi. It will consist of 10 ex-officio members and 22 part-time members appointed by the Central government. The NMC will have autonomous boards under the NMC Act, Under Graduate Medical Education Board (UGMEB), Post Graduate Medical Education Board (PGMEB), Medical Assessment and Rating Board and the Ethics and Medical Registration Board. 

According to the new medical education structure under the NMC the common final-year Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) examination will now be known as the National Exit Test (NEXT). “Before selection in PG now medical students after MBBS has to go for NEXT based on their results selection for the PG will be done,” says Dr M.C. Misra, former director of AIIMS.