Telangana triumphs in medical education adding highest number of new state-run colleges across India

HYDERABAD: Telangana triumphed in medical education and widened its horizon by ensuring manifold growth in number of medical colleges in government as well as private sector

Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao inaugurated nine medical colleges at a time on Friday, taking the total number of medical colleges from a niggardly five in 2014 to 28 now – in the last nine years in the government sector. Thus, Telangana becomes the third state to have the highest number of government medical colleges (28) preceded by Uttar Pradesh (35) and Maharashtra (32).

If the Union Government’s two medical colleges – ESIC (Employees State Insurance Corporation) and AIIMS (All-India Institute of Medical Sciences) with 100 seats each – are excluded, the total number of medical colleges added by the Telangana Government to the State-run medical colleges comes to 26.

However, Telangana carved a unique distinction by setting up the highest number of medical colleges in the government sector across India in the last nine years.

While Telangana has added 23 medical colleges, the BJP–ruled Uttar Pradesh came close on the heels with (21) followed by the Congress-ruled Rajasthan with (18) in the state sector.

Uttar Pradesh has a population of 24.14 crore, while Telangana has a population of 3.8 crore. Uttar Pradesh has 80 Lok Sabha constituencies as opposed to Telangana’s 17. This difference in the magnitude of the States brings to focus how effectively the Telangana State Government has worked on expanding medical education.

In the private sector too, Telangana could add 13 medical colleges preceded by Uttar Pradesh with 17 and followed by Gujarat and Karnataka with 12 each. With the addition of new medical colleges Telangana boasts of the top most position in the increased number of seats in government sector registering a growth of 2,900 seats followed by Uttar Pradesh with 2,125 seats and Rajasthan 2,100. All others are far behind.

Annexed below is a table that explains a comparative data of total number of medical colleges, seats in government and private medical colleges in Telangana as opposed to 14 BJP ruled states and four congress ruled states

There were five colleges at the time of formation of Telangana in 2014 - Osmania Medical College, Gandhi Medical college (Hyderabad), Kakatiya Medical College (Warangal), Adilabad and Nizamabad. Following are the places year-wise where new medical colleges were setup.

Mahabubnagar and Siddipet in academic year-2016-2017; Nalgonda and Suryapet (2017-2018); Mancherial, Ramagundem, Jagtial, Wanaparthy, Nagarkurnool, Mahbubabad, Bhadradri-Kothagudem and Sangareddy (2022-2023); Kamareddy, Karimnagar, Khammam, Jayashankar Bhupalpally, Kumuram Bheem Asifabad, Nirmal, Rajanna Sircilla, Vikarabad and Jangaon (2023-2024).

The Telangana government proposes to add eight more medical colleges in 2024-2025. They are: Jogulamba Gadwal, Narayanpet, Mulugu, Warangal Narsampet, Medak, Yadadri Bhuvanagiri, Rangareddy and Medchal-Malkajgiri. 

From 5 medical colleges to 28

At the time of formation of Telangana, there were only five government medical colleges in the state. In this, three were established without the involvement of previous governments. Osmania Medical College in 1856, Gandhi Hospital in 1954, Kakatiya Medical College in 1959 under the support of Warangal Regional Education Society were established. Thus, the role of leaders in undivided Andhra in establishment of medical colleges was insignificant.

Only two government medical colleges were established during the 60 years of undivided Andhra Pradesh. During Telangana movement when KCR questioned and demanded, as a perfunctory Adilabad RIMS in 2008 and Nizamabad College in 2013 were established.

Only two medical colleges were established during six decades of undivided Andhra Pradesh, but in just one decade 21 government medical colleges were established by KCR.

Establishment of one medical college for each district is nearing completion with 8 medical colleges sanctioned to start next year.

In 2014, there were only 850 seats through five medical colleges, by 2023 the number of medical seats reached to 3,690 with 26 medical colleges

Today, Telangana has grown to the level of producing 10,000 doctors a year, through both government and private colleges.

Telangana tops the country with 22 MBBS seats per lakh population.

Telangana's share of increased MBBS seats across the country in 2022-23 is 43 percent.

Changes in the law provides wide opportunities for Telangana students

The Telangana government has provided wide opportunities to students belonging to the State who want to pursue medical education

In the medical colleges established after June 2, 2014, 100 percent of the seats in the competent authority were reserved for Telangana students.

The Telangana Government has issued orders amending the admission rules in Telangana State Medical Colleges and High Court has upheld this decision.

Earlier, only 85 percent of the seats were given to local students and the remaining 15 percent were unreserved. Apart from Telangana, AP students also competed but due to the latest decision Telangana students got another 520 seats.

In addition to this, 85 percent of the MBBS ‘B’ category seats are reserved locally for Telangana students, adding another 1,300 MBBS seats for the State’s students.

Due to these two progressive decisions taken by the Telangana government, students will get a total of 1,820 seats every year. An addition of 1,820 seats is equivalent to setting up about 20 new medical colleges. The increase in the number of colleges also increases the number of seats every year.

The increase in ST reservation quota from 6% to 10% seat was allocated to a student who had secured a rank of 209646 last year.

Centre’s discrimination against Telangana

Central Government sanctioned 157 Medical Colleges in three phases to different states. Nursing colleges have also been sanctioned recently, but not a single medical college or nursing college has been sanctioned to Telangana.

As many as 26 for Uttar Pradesh, 23 for Rajasthan, 12 for Madhya Pradesh, 12 for West Bengal and 11 for Tamil Nadu were sanctioned. But Telangana was shown empty hands.

(With inputs from the research team)