Chief minister Miss Mamata Banerjee, who also heads the health department, today expressed her concern over the infrastructural facilities mainly acute shortage of doctors in the public healthcare services. While addressing the question hour in the state Assembly, she accused the Centre of its policy on medical education system and said, “We don’t have adequate number of doctors at a time when we have increased the number of multi-super hospitals as well as indoor beds across the state.”

“We are not getting doctors because of the Central government’s policy on healthcare system,” the chief minister said. “We are spending Rs 30 to Rs 35 lakh to produce a doctor but are not getting their services in our state healthcare system,” she regretted. “Our state is being deprived of the services of adequate number of doctors because of the NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test, an all India level common entrance exam conducted by CBSC for admissions to MBBS and BDS respectively) which is making them go outside Bengal,” the chief minister added.

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“Medical Council of India (MCI) is all set to be abolished by the Centre though this year, we wanted to recruit 820 doctors in government health services,” she said. “Only 105 candidates had applied and finally 39 doctors joined the service,” the chief minister said. “I admit that there has been a crisis of doctors in rural healthcare services but it is a nationwide issue,” she added while responding to Congress MLA Nepal Mahato’s contention that health care in Purulia district is badly affected owing to acute shortage of doctors. “I always counsel the toppers in secondary and high secondary exams to become doctors so that we can meet up the shortfall,” the chief minister said.

The minister of state for health Chandrima Bhattacharya said that the state government has increased number of seats in the undergraduate medical course since 2011 when Trinamul Congress came to power in Bengal. “We have now 3,650 seats in MBBS course in our government and private medical colleges in our state which was only 1,355 during the Left Front regime,” Bhattacharya said in the question hour.

“In all, we have recruited 6,100 doctors and 15,454 nurses for our government hospitals and medical colleges since 2011,” she said. The West Bengal Health Services Recruitment Board has made a recruitment of 33,855 persons as doctors, nurses, para-medical staff, technicians, pharmacists and many other posts in the state during last eight years in different phases, she said. The four new medical colleges run by the government in Rampurhat, Diamond Harbour, Cooch Behar and Raiganj have started admissions in the first year MBBS course and these four teaching hospitals with 100 seats each will accommodate 400 students.