Pune: Medical and dental students have to serve compulsory one-year bond service at government hospitals in rural areas otherwise they will not get admission in MD/ MS course, the State government has declared. The rule is mandated from academic year 2018-19. 

The State Medical Education Department issued a circular stating that students failing to complete the bond service will not be considered eligible for taking admission in MD/MS course hereafter. 

Those getting admissions in government colleges are liable to undertake minimum one year of rural posting. The government has come out with this decision in the wake of lesser number of students completing the one year bond service and to retain doctors in government hospitals. 

Medical and dental students after completion of MBBS/ BDS course from government colleges are supposed to serve for one year at government hospitals in rural areas due to paucity of doctors in remote places. 

However, students dodge the one-year service saying they will complete it post MD/ MS course and fail to do so, defeating the purpose of deploying more doctors at rural areas. 

This resolution has not been received on a positive note by students aspiring for MD/ MS course for the coming year. 

“Government should understand why students do not complete the bond immediately after internship. The National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET) is one of the toughest exams with deep study of 19 subjects from first to third years of MBBS which requires intense focused study daily. If MD/MS admissions were done on the basis of MBBS performance, students would have been more than happy to serve the bond to get first hand experience and not worry about future admission to PG course,” said a student on condition of anonymity. 

Another students said, “Our government doesn't have enough posts to accommodate all doctors, nor enough resources to pay so many doctors at the same time. It's just making a scapegoat of doctors to divert the public's attention from their own inadequacy to provide better healthcare at the rural level. What the government is claiming that no doctors are available to work in rural areas is actually not correct as in a recent advertisement by permanent medical officer it was declared that 1,600 MBBS doctors had applied against 394 posts.”