KGMCTA demands withdrawal of mass transfer order of doctors

Kerala Government Medical College Teachers’ Association has demanded that the mass transfer of faculty in Government Medical Colleges in the name of “work arrangement” be withdrawn immediately as this was bound to affect medical education and training adversely.

KGMCTA raised the objection after the Medical Education department issued orders transferring overnight, 58 specialist doctors from Manjeri, Thrissur, Kozhikode, Thiruvananthapuram and Kannur Medical Colleges, to the new medical colleges of Wayanad and Kasaragod, citing “work arrangement”.

The fact that this was done on the eve of the inspection of the new medical colleges by the National Medical Commission, makes it all too obvious that the “work arrangement” was just a guise to get NMC approval for the new institutions, it said

In a statement here, KGMCTA pointed out that it had suggested to the government several times over that adequate faculty posts and infrastructure should be created in the new Government Medical Colleges at Wayanad and Kasaragod before making these institutions functional.

However, the government has not paid heed to these suggestions and has resorted to a mass transfer of faculty, without even sparing those faculty members who are due to retire from service within a short period, KGMCTA said. This was not the first time that the government was resorting to this “mass transfer” to fool the NMC

According to the order issued by the DME, 39 faculty members have been transferred to Kasaragod Medical College and 19 to Wayanad and they have been asked to take charge at the respective institutions the very next day itself. KGMCTA has demanded that the government review this order.

The current crisis at Wayanad and Kasaragod is a result of the government’s refusal to create adequate faculty posts. By transferring faculty from other medical colleges, the government was destabilising patient care activities and teaching at the rest of the medical colleges too. The older medical colleges too do not have adequate numbers of doctors to manage patient care and teaching, KGMCTA pointed out.

It said that the departments of Gynaecology, Orthopaedics and Dermatology have not had any post creation in ages and this woeful shortage of doctors was evident in other departments too.

Kasaragod Medical College is in its infancy while the government has not created the basic infrastructural needs in Wayanad Medical College. Almost all other medical colleges too have received notices from the NMC, pointing out various shortfalls and the government’s gimmicks to get NMC approval will eventually affect the recognition of the graduate and postgraduate courses in these institutions, KGMCTA said.

The NMC has warned several times that any anomalies in the Aadhar-based punching system will lead to the cancellation of the registration of doctors. The government has totally disregarded this in issuing the mass transfer order. The GO does not even say how long is the “work arrangement” for, KGMCTA pointed out

Published - June 19, 2025 08:54 pm IST