Private Medical Colleges Failing to Pay Adequate Stipend to MBBS Interns: NMC tells Supreme Court
Supreme Court of India
New Delhi: Several private medical colleges across the country are failing to pay proper stipends to the MBBS interns, and many of the colleges are reportedly offering meagre sums or none at all, the National Medical Commission (NMC) has informed the Supreme Court recently.
NMC's submissions come when the Supreme Court is set to hear the pleas challenging non-payment of stipends to MBBS interns in July 2025. The issue of non-payment of stipend to medical students was being considered by the Apex Court after the Court took note of an allegation that MBBS interns in 70 percent of the medical colleges in the country were not paid a stipend.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that while considering the matter, the Supreme Court had asked the National Medical Commission (NMC) to respond to the claim by filing an affidavit giving a tabulated chart of colleges that were paying the stipend to the interns and which were not paying.
However, noting that the details submitted by NMC were not of all the medical colleges across all the States, the Apex Court bench comprising Justices Sudhanshu Dhulia and Prasanna Bhalachandra Varale had ordered on April 01, 2024, to submit all the details within four weeks.
Consequently, NMC had asked the medical colleges across the country to submit the details of the stipend paid to their UG Interns, Post-Graduate Residents, and Senior Residents or PGs in Super Specialty for the financial year 2023-24.
Also Read: Non-Payment of Stipend to MBBS Interns- Supreme Court to Hear Plea in July
As per the latest media report by India Today, in its recent submissions before the Apex Court, the Apex Medical Commission informed that 60 medical colleges, including 27 private and 33 government-run institutes, are not paying any stipend to the medical interns, despite their hard work and clinical duties in their final year.
The amount of stipend for the MBBS interns at private medical colleges is decided by the institute. Even though the Postgraduate Medical Education Regulations (2023) mandate the private medical colleges to pay stipends on par with the government medical colleges in that particular State/UT, the 2021 internship regulations by NMC are not clear about this.
According to the guidelines, the MBBS interns should receive a monthly stipend as decided by the appropriate State authorities. While the MBBS interns at the government medical institutes sometimes get Rs 35,000 per month, many private medical colleges pay a meagre amount, while some of the institutes avoid paying altogether.
For instance, the private medical institutes in Andhra Pradesh pay Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 per month to the MBBS interns even though the tuition fee ranges from Rs 65 lakh to more than Rs 1 crore.
Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that in Telangana, MBBS interns alleged that private medical colleges pay the stipulated stipend amount to the bank accounts of the students, only to reclaim most of the amount in cash.
In fact, the MBBS interns from States like Telangana and Karnataka also alleged being threatened with academic penalties if they raised concerns. This is the situation, even though the interns are left with no option but to work on 36-40 hour duty shifts.
