Telangana: MCI initiates digitization of practitioners data

Hyderabad : The Medical Council of India's Digital Mission Mode Project (DMMP), an e-governance project, is going to bring approximately 45,000 practising allopaths in Telangana and another 18,000 in Hyderabad, under one umbrella. MCI will provide them with a unique identity card, as a part of its effort to create a unified database of all doctors in India.

The purpose behind introducing this project is to wean -off ghost medical faculty, by monitoring attendance through Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Cards. Besides this, the other uses of DMMP include: improving the complaint and grievance redress concerning doctors, act as a repository of doctor certificates and be the online channel for them to access all MCI's services.

The program, which was initiated  by the MCI this month, by asking all private medical colleges to concede and join the e-governance program, has its  modalities still in the making.

Dr Ramesh Reddy, who was one of the three member committee backing the e-governance project, was also the first among the three, to moot the concept in March 2015. He also got it ratified with a resolution at the first meeting of the MCI's re-structured body in Delhi.

Speaking about the project acting as a deterrent against ghost faculty, Dr. Reddy elaborated, "Unlike in the past, nobody can fool MCI's inspection teams now as ghost medical faculty would be automatically detected. Since the RFID card will have a bio-metric attendance system; the new e-governance project will also enable MCI to detect frauds like use of ghost attendance of medical faculty shown by medical colleges to increase their seat intake."

The Union Health Ministry has sanctioned a sum of Rs. 45 Crore towards implementation costs, for this MCI proposed e-governance project. A venture meant to check deployment of fake medical faculty and tracking attendance in medical colleges –both in the government & private sector.

Talking about ghost medical faculty, one of the three new medical colleges in Telangana, permitted to take up MBBS admissions for the year 2016-17, by the Supreme court, were found to have employed three ghost faculty, for the MCI inspection in the past.

"There is no choice as all doctors would have to follow the MCI's guideline on DMMP now," said Telangana State Medical Council, Chairman, Dr. E Ravinder Reddy.  He also informed that their representative attended a high-level meeting conducted by the MCI on the e-governance project on Friday.

Simultaneously, all the 16 Telangana Private Medical Colleges' Association (TPMCA) members have been asked to appoint a nodal officer each to share their details with two systems integrator, namely Bodhtree Consulting Ltd and Tecninfy Solutions Pvt Ltd as an act of implementation of the e governance project.

Private medical colleges have also been asked to deposit Rs 2 lac each towards their participation in the e governance project.