Maharashtra cuts 27 Community Medicine faculty posts, reallocates 18 to new medical colleges
Mumbai: To align with the National Medical Commission (NMC) norms, the state government has slashed the sanctioned strength of faculty posts in Community Medicine departments across government medical colleges from 309 to 282.
Issuing a government resolution (GR) in connection with this on August 25, the government has withdrawn 27 faculty posts, including those of professors, associate professors and assistant professors from older medical colleges where the sanctioned strength was higher than the revised NMC requirement.
While cutting down the faculty strength, 18 new faculty posts have also been created in new government medical colleges, and these positions will be filled by reallocating faculty posts withdrawn from the older institutions.
By doing so, the government aims to ensure that faculty posts are distributed according to the actual requirements of each medical college.
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The reason behind the move is the establishment of several new government medical colleges and changes in faculty requirements under the National Medical Commission (NMC) regulations.
Under the NMC’s UG-MSR 2023 norms, the required faculty strength is determined based on a medical college’s annual MBBS intake, with different staffing requirements prescribed for colleges offering 50, 100, 150, 200 and 250 seats.
The GR clarified that certain older colleges in the state had sanctioned posts in excess of the revised regulations, whereas newer colleges had fewer than required. Consequently, posts exceeding the standard norms have been either cancelled or transferred to colleges where there was an urgent need.
Speaking to TOI, Dr Dilip Mhaisekar, former director, Directorate of Medical Education and Research, said, "Under the previous policy, a higher number of posts was sanctioned. These have now been reallocated due to the National Medical Commission’s new regulations. This is a positive step that will not impact the quality of teaching or patient care. Reallocating these posts to locations facing a shortage will help facilitate better medical education in those areas."
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