Tamil Nadu: Medical education mess

An August 6 judgement of the Madras high court summarily dismissing serious charges filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against a Chennai-based private medical college accused of illegally collecting capitation fees, and four private medical colleges for fraudulently presenting impersonators as faculty members during inspection by a Medical Council of India (MCI) team, has shocked and outraged educationists, lawyers and the general public in Tamil Nadu. In a speedily delivered judgement, the court dismissed a CBI revision petition challenging the discharge of administrators of Shri Sathya Sai Medical College and Research Institute and Melmaruvathur Adhi Parasakthi Institute of Medical Sciences (earlier discharged by a trial court) and quashed charges against the Sri Lakshmi Narayana Institute of Medical Sciences. All three institutions were accused of forging documents and presenting impersonators not on their faculty payrolls before an MCI inspection team in April 2010 to secure or renew recognition of their colleges. Consequently they were charged under Section 420 (cheating), 463 (forgery) and 120-B (conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. Delivering the high court™s judgement, Justice Aruna Jagadeesan said that the MCI Act, 1956 does not prescribe penal consequences for violation of its provisions, and ruled that faculty shortfalls and submission of false declaration forms were not punishable offences under the provisions of IPC or the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA), 1988. œContravention of rules may be an offence against the statute but is not a crime. There is no room or jurisdiction for any external agency (like the CBI) to investigate the affairs of a medical institution coming within the purview of the Medical Council of India, she ruled stressing the point that the MCI Act was a self-contained law with provisions to punish misconduct by doctors and medical institutions. Therefore it was improper for the CBI to file criminal charges against violators. The speed and pedantic reasoning with which the high court dismissed charges against the four medical colleges has stunned judicial circles in the state. œBy taking away the CBI™s jurisdiction, the high court has given unfettered powers to MCI. Although every regulatory and statutory body has its own rules and regulations, they cannot be outside the purview of the CBI, said a veteran prosecutor quoted by the Times of India (August 9). The high court verdict highlights how badly drafted legislation, casual enforcement and cavalier judicial interpretation have allowed scams and scandals in medical education to grow and multiply. Despite the Tamil Nadu Educational Institutions (Prohibition of Collection of Capitation Fee) Act, 1992 and two Supreme court verdicts in the T.M.A Pai Foundation Case (2002) and P.A Inamdar vs. State of Maharashtra (2005) specifically prohibiting the levy of admission or capitation fees by professional education institutions, the state™s 22 private medical college managements routinely extract huge capitation fees under the management quota. To date not a single college or official thereof has been convicted for breaching this law. According to educationists in Chennai, the dubious practice of hastily mobilising faculty and equipment from other medical…