KARACHI, Jan 16: The Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) has stopped seven private medical and dental colleges of Karachi from making fresh admissions and conducting professional examinations till it renews their recognition.

Sources in the PMDC said the 97th session of the Council, besides taking other decisions, also decided to suspend the existing/provisional recognition and approval to many medical educational institutions both in the public and private sectors throughout the country, that included seven in Karachi which had been functioning for the past 3-6 years.

The Karachi-based institutions, which earned the PMDC’s disqualification, were either functioning as constituent parts of private medical and engineering universities or were affiliated to other university/universities. One of the private university has also awarded medical degree to one of its batches.

If the PMDC’s decision is implemented, it is likely that at least 1,500 medical students, who have already spent huge amounts on account of admission and tuition fees at the institutions in question in the past few years, would have to wait for their respective professional examinations and promotion to the next classes initially for six months.

In some cases the commencement of examinations either could be delayed for an uncertain period or these could also be scrapped altogether. It would depend on the institutions that how much time they consumed in rectifying the deficiencies determined/pointed out by the Council, said a senior medical professional.

Ignorant of the development and restrictions, a controller of examination at one such private university informed this reporter that the University had announced that it would hold the MBBS examinations from Jan 21 and BDS examinations from Jan 28. On an average a student has to pay Rs150,000 a year for education in a private medical college.

According to PMDC documents, in the case of Jinnah Medical and Dental College it was said that the deficiencies were gross and needed rectification on an urgent basis. The Council decided to suspend the provisional recognition of the college for six months with immediate effect and asked it to stop new admission and not to hold any professional examination to promote students to the next classes until the deficiencies were rectified.

The Council, that met on Dec 29 and 30 at Islamabad, noted that deficiencies in terms of physical facilities and availability of the faculty at Ziauddin Medical College were gross and needed urgent rectification. Giving six months’ time to the college for rectifying the deficiencies, the Council decided to suspend the provisional recognition of the college, and asked it to stop new admission and not to conduct professional examination until the deficiencies were rectified.

However, the Council decided to allow the registration of first batch of MBBS of Ziauddin Medical College.

In the case of Liaquat Ali Khan Memorial College of Dentistry, the Council gave it three months’ time for rectification of deficiencies and inform it accordingly. The college should stop new admission and no professional examination be conducted to promote students to the next class until the deficiencies were rectified, the PMDC’s report said.

The Council further decided that Baqai Medical College BMC) and Baqai Dental College (BDC) should stop new admission and no professional examination be conducted, and to suspend the provisional recognition of the two colleges. After certain

clarifications by the colleges’ representatives at the Islamabad meeting, the Council also decided to conduct surprise inspection of the BMC and BDC as early as possible and reports be placed before the Executive Committee for further action and decision.

The Council considered the comprehensive inspection reports of the dental section of Hamdard College of Medicine and Dentistry and noted that numerous deficiencies identified in the inspection report needed rectification by the college on an urgent basis.

The Council decided to suspend the provisional recognition of the college and to stop it from holding professional examination.

In the case of Hamdard College of Medicine and Dentistry, the Council also decided to suspend its recognition and to stop it from conducting professional examination.

Sir Syed College of Medical Sciences for Girls was asked to stop admission and not to conduct professional examination.

The recognition of the college was also suspended and it was given six months’ time to rectify the deficiencies and inform the PMDC secretariat about progress for further action.

Expressing surprise over the delayed PMDC action, a medical academician said the ultimate sufferer would be the students.

The PMDC delayed timely review and action, ignoring the general apprehension about the credibility, quality and capabilities of education provided in medical colleges of both the private and public sectors, the senior teacher said, adding that now hundreds of medical students faced an uncertain future.

If the PMDC bosses were sincere to the students or to the cause of medical education, they could have taken these decisions and publicized it properly much before the commencement of admissions to private medical colleges. Apart from the admissions given in the previous years on the basis of provisional recognition by the PMDC, this year too some of the private colleges had given admissions, said a student of a medical college.

It was learnt that representatives of different medical colleges of Karachi were invited by the PMDC, during the meeting at Islamabad, to clarify their positions about the deficiencies pointed out by PMDC inspection teams.

Some of the representatives requested the Council to give them more time to fulfil the PMDC’s requirements, sources said.