State pauses mandatory rural service postings for docs

Bengaluru: In another twist to the saga of mandatory rural service for graduate and post-graduate doctors, the department of health and family welfare Friday kept in abeyance the notification that initiated the process to post MBBS graduates who had passed out in April 2024 for one-year stints in govt rural health facilities.
The move came a day after the window opened for fresh MBBS graduates to exercise their options for the postings.It may be recalled that a similar notification issued in July this year for posting PG doctors has been stayed by the high court.
A corrigendum signed by the commissioner of health and family welfare services said the Sept 9 notification that announced a calendar of events for compulsory service postings for MBBS graduates who had taken admissions in 2018-19 is being kept in abeyance in view of oral and written representations from candidates who had raised issues like the impending NEET-PG counselling and vacancy positions.
The September 9 notification had been followed up with a vacancy list of 377 posts from which students could opt. A merit list of 756 students was also drawn up.
According to new graduate doctors, the merit list was based on their academic performance. Students who secured 71% to 84% marks were part of this list. Resentment brewed among the fresh MBBS graduates over the notification.
"The notification issued by you defeats the very objective of compulsory service by providing for exemptions. Besides, choosing only 756 candidates out of the nearly 7,000 MBBS graduates who had passed out in July 2024 for participation in counselling and offering to post them in 356 vacant posts, you have tainted the entire exercise with discrimination. You have exempted thousands of candidates from the compulsory service mandate and saddled a minute fraction of the pass-outs with the compulsory service mandate. By invoking merit and choosing a few meritorious, you have made it appear that those with merit will have to render the compulsory service and those without can walk scot-free without any such encumbrances," read a representation submitted by a few candidates to the health and family welfare department on Friday and accessed by TOI.
Pointing out that they had completed their degrees five months ago, the students said many of them have secured jobs or are in the midst of getting counselled for NEET-PG admissions. They raised concern that it is unfair to draw a combined merit list of RGUHS-affiliated colleges as well as deemed universities as they take different exams and are evaluated differently, thus making the list "illegal, ad hoc, discriminatory and arbitrary".
The department, however, took a U-turn within hours of receiving the representations. "Further directions regarding the compulsory rural service counselling will be notified on the department website," the order keeping the process in abeyance said.