J&K to establish medical universities in Srinagar and Jammu

NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 13: In order to provide better medical education to the aspiring medical students, the Government of Jammu and Kashmir will set up two new universities in Srinagar and Jammu. These universities will focus on conducting exams, imporve standard of teaching and research in the medical colleges.

Reportedly, the new universities might bring uniformity in the pattern of medical education which has suffered due to inadequacy of coordination between non-technical universities and the Medical Council of India (MCI).

K Vijay Kumar, Advisor to the Governor held a meeting in this regard and asked the officials to accelerate the process of establishing two new universities. as per the discussion, five new institutes will be added to make nine medical colleges in the state. A separate medical university is needed to administrate these nine colleges.

Currently, the examination and other academic issues of the medical colleges in Jammu and Kashmir are being administered by two non-technical institutes i.e. the University of Kashmir and the University of Jammu in their respective regions.

As per the guidelines of MCI, the duration of MBBS course is five and a half years with 12 months of rotatory internship. However, in Kashmir, the medical students takes one year extra to complete the course due to delay of examinations by the University of Kashmir.