CBI conducts raids at 91 places including various State Medical Council offices, as FMGE Fake medical certificate racket unearthed
New Delhi: Suspecting a major racket of many unqualifed foregin medical graduates practicng in India with valid council registrations, the Central Bureau of Investigations has begun its search across the country on the matter
The CBI recently conducted searches at 91 locations across the country on Thursday in connection with its investigation against several state medical councils and foreign medical graduates who were allowed to practice in India without qualifying a mandatory test, officials said.
"The Central Bureau of Investigation has conducted searches at around 91 locations including at Delhi, Chandigarh, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Bhatinda, Khanna, Karnal, Sawaimadhopur, Narvana, Hamirpur, Shimla, Jammu, Srinagar, Dehradun, Ghaziabad, Guwahati, Tejpur, Imphal, Sikkim, Rajpur, Patna, Munger, Mumbai, Jaipur, Sikar, Vijayawada, Warangal, Tirunelveli, Madurai, Bhopal, Nagpur, Buldana, Pune, Jalgaon, Dharbhanga, Bhagalpur, Champaran, Begusarai, Bokaro, Vizag, Hajipur, Vaishali, Nalanda etc at the premises of certain Medical Councils as well as Foreign Medical Graduates(FMGs) which led to recovery of several incriminating documents, including fake Pass Certificates of the FMG Examination," CBI stated
The agency had registered an FIR against 14 state medical councils and 73 foreign medical graduates who were allowed to practice medicine in India without qualifying the mandatory Foreign Medical Graduate Examination (FMGE), they said.
According to norms, a foreign medical graduate must qualify FMGE/Screening Test conducted by the National Board of Examination in order to get provisional or permanent registration with the National Medical Commission or a state medical council to practice medicine in India.
The sources said NBE sends its results to candidates as well as councils, they said.
The National Board of Examination had intimated the Ministry of Health that 73 such medical graduates who did their MBBS from foreign countries such as Russia, Ukraine, China, and Nigeria during 2011-22 have not qualified its examination and yet got registration from various state medical councils.
When fake eligibility certificates were produced by these candidates, medical councils could have verified it from the results directly sent to them by NBE, they said.
Following this, an under secretary in the Health Ministry lodged a complaint to the CBI and cited two letters dated September 12 and October 17 received from the NBE in this regard. NBE also provided the list of those 73 candidates and provided details about those doctors along with their registration with the SMCs.
The CBI has registered the case of alleged corruption, criminal conspiracy, forgery and cheating against unidentified officials of state medical councils, the erstwhile Medical Council of India, and 73 foreign medical graduates, the officials said.
