In a recent release, the Government has announced that the stipend for the medical interns in Punjab has been increased from Rs 15,000 to Rs 22,000 per month.
Similarly, after the hike, the Junior resident doctors will get Rs 76,000 in their first year, Rs 77,000 in their second year, and Rs 78,000 in their third year. Earlier, the JRs used to get Rs 67,968 as a monthly stipend.
The stipend for the senior residents has also been increased from Rs 81,562 to Rs 92,000 in the first year, Rs 93,000 in the second year, and Rs 94,000 in the third year.
As per the latest media report by Hindustan Times, at present, the government medical and dental colleges in Punjab have 907 sanctioned posts for interns, 1,408 posts for junior residents and 754 posts for senior residents.
While announcing the stipend hike on Thuesday, Finance Minister Cheema said that due to the hike in stipend amount, the annual expenditure on stipends will rise from existing Rs 204.96 crore to Rs 238.18 crore. Therefore, there will be Rs 33.22 crore extra expenses.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that the MBBS interns and resident doctors in Punjab had been protesting against the high fee structure and low stipend amounts. They had been urging the authorities to increase the stipend and rationalise the tuition fee and other institutional fees.
Amid this protest, the Department of Medical Education and Research, Punjab released a fee structure for admission into the MBBS and BDS courses in Government Medical Institutions, Government Societies, Government Dental Institutions, Private Institutes and Universities. The new fee structure, which was announced on June 13, revealed that the total MBBS course fee in government medical colleges and government society-run institutes (excluding the NRI quota) was decided at Rs 9,98,000 from the academic year 2025-2026. For the NRI candidates in government colleges, the full course fee has been fixed at $1,10,000.
This fee hike was vehemently opposed by the medical students. Apart from this, the doctors had also opposed the two-year MBBS bond policy recently introduced by the Punjab Government.
Protesting over the unmet demands regarding stipend hike and rationalisation of tuition fees, RDA Faridkot and RDA Patiala decided to boycott their OPD duties last month. Consequently, the resident doctors had given a call for a peaceful sit-in Dharna protest.
Finally, they had agreed to call off their more than 50-day-long protest after the State Government agreed to increase their stipend and assured to make the fee structure in Punjab GMCs more affordable.
Also Read: Punjab Doctors shut OPD in protest demanding stipend hike, rationalised fee structure
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