The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday issued notice seeking reply from the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) and the University of Health Sciences (UHS) by June 27 on a petition challenging the quality of education in private medical colleges.
The order was passed by the LHC’s division bench comprising Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Abdul Waheed Khan in response to a petition by the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) through its counsel Chaudhry Waseem A Bhaddar.
Arguing his case, the petitioner submitted that the private colleges neither had 500-bed hospitals affiliated with their colleges nor had nursing colleges established with them. Hence they did not fulfill the mandatory requirements according to the PMDC rules and regulations.
The counsel prayed the court to restore the student-teacher ratio in medical colleges which had been lowered by the PMDC and complained that the private medical colleges were not offering house jobs to their graduates. He contended that the private medical colleges had converted the medical education into a business which was affecting the quality of education and was damaging the reputation of Pakistani doctors worldwide.
The petitioner-association prayed the court to direct the PMDC not to register more colleges till the decision of the petition and submit a detailed report of all the registered colleges after holding a proper inspection.