Frame policy to tackle faculty crisis in medical colleges: Guv

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, August 13

Asking the recruiting agencies to prioritise selections for the pending vacancies in the health and medical education department, Governor NN Vohra on Monday called for drawing a policy to overcome the acute and recurring human resource shortage in this critical sector.

“The J&K Public Service Commission (JKPSC) should expedite the recruitment for the posts of medical officer and faculty positions for new medical colleges and ensure completion of the same before November-end, if not earlier,” the Governor said at a high-level meeting convened here on Monday afternoon to take a holistic review of the human resource position in the state’s health and medical education sector. Taking serious note of the faculty crunch in medical colleges and superspecialty hospitals, the Governor called for working out policy interventions to deal with this important issue. He asked the Chief Secretary to bring up a comprehensive policy in this regard.

Vohra also reiterated his earlier direction regarding urgent constitution of a committee of officers and experts which shall oversee all issues related to the operationalisation of the five new medical colleges.

Responding to JKPSC chairman’s difficulty regarding the lack of adequate manpower in the commission, the Governor asked Chief Secretary to urgently post the required personnel to ensure time-bound selections.

Regarding the filling up of para-medical vacancies in the new medical colleges, J&K Services Selection Board chairman was asked to urgently reconcile 1,895 referred vacancies with the finance department so that the selection process was started immediately.

The Governor called for putting the requisite infrastructure and human resource in place for the new medical colleges coming up at Anantnag, Baramulla, Doda, Kathua and Rajouri well before the visit of the members of the Medical Council of India so that the academic courses in these colleges could start as per schedule next year. He asked the Chief Secretary to regularly examine imposition of condition for the passing-out graduates of these new medical colleges to work in the state for prescribed periods after graduation.

Vohra also called for conducting regular departmental promotion committee meetings to ensure filling up of promotion quota vacancies.

The meeting was informed that the JKPSC needs to urgently complete the selection process of the already referred 158 posts of lecturers to make the superspecialty hospitals fully functional and to fill the posts in the government medical colleges to meet the norms laid down by the Medical Council of India.