Telangana Private Medical Colleges Credit Rs 25,000 Stipend, take back Rs 20,000 in Cash, allege interns

Hyderabad: Amid the ongoing protests by the intern doctors at the private medical colleges, interns from multiple private medical colleges across the State have alleged that the managements and administrations at the private medical institutes do not conply with the 2023 Government Order mandating Rs 25,906 monthly stipend for the medical interns across both government and private medical colleges in Telangana.

An intern at Patnam Mahender Reddy Institute of Medical Sciences alleged that while Rs 25,000 is credited to their bank account every month, it gets withdrawn by the college authorities ultimately. The college gets back Rs 20,000 in cash, The Hindu has reported.

"We are made to open specific bank accounts just for this purpose. It is all a show so they can claim compliance on paper," the intern doctor said.

Also Read: Telangana Private Medical College MBBS interns Protest Demanding Equal Stipend

As per the latest media report by The Hindu, when the students raised these concerns with the college management, they were told that while the stipends could not be paid, the institute would waive bus and hostel fees instead. "But even those promises remain only on paper," the intern doctor told The Hindu.

"We work 36-hour to 40‑hour shifts, caring for real patients, often in inadequate facilities and instead of fair pay, we are being extorted and silenced," another intern added.

While this is the scenario at PMIMRS, several intern doctors at the private medical colleges have alleged that the management is paying them Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 per month, flouting the Government Order.

Commenting on the matter, an intern from Chalmeda Anand Rao Medical College in Karimnagar informed The Daily that the students receive just Rs 2,000 as monthly stipend and that too as a lumpsum amount after six months.

"We are sent on compulsory field visits to rural health centres but are not allowed to use our personal vehicles. The college insists we use their bus and then deducts the transport charges from our stipend. So, for two to three months, we end up getting only ₹500 or ₹1,000 as stipend," said the intern.

The student further informed how the fear of administrative back;ash is silencing many student. He added, "If someone raises their voice individually, they are threatened with academic retaliation, blocking logbooks or delaying internship completion. That could make us ineligible for NEET-PG, so most remain silent."

Meanwhile, another intern informed that some of the colleges are using a 2003 Government Order that allowed the colleges to collect a one-time 'stipend fee' of Rs 5,000 per year. The intern told The Hindu, "They are using a two-decade-old GO to justify this exploitation, even though multiple new GOs and NMC directives have since superseded it."

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported how MBBS interns at several private medical colleges in Telangana started a protest demanding equal stipend as per the National Medical Commission norms and the Telangana Government Orders.