Shillong, Mar 27: The National Medical Commission (NMC) will conduct an inspection of the upcoming Shillong Medical College within May this year and it is expected to clear the path towards opening of the college.
“If everything goes well with the NMC inspection, we should be on our way to full-fledged functioning of the medical college,” health minister Ampareen Lyngdoh told reporters after chairing the governing council meeting of the Shillong Medical College Management Society (SMCMS).
Informing that everything related to the college is going well within stipulated time, she said the challenge faced by the department in taking over the building from erstwhile Suraksha Diagnostic Centre (SDC) is also over.
After winning the case filed by SDC, the government no has full authority to take over the administrative block, she said.
“We have handed over the complex to the contractor on the March 16 and we expect the administrative block to be quickly put in position and now with that we have crossed yet another milestone,” she said.
Highlighting steps taken to comply with the requirements for teaching faculty, she said, “We recently advertised for recruitment of professors and that also has gone well, we have had some takers.”
“Like I said, we want a ‘Ghar Wapasi’ to happen in the medical fraternity, and we are requesting our sons of the soil who are Meghalayans to come back and contribute to this very important project,” she said.
Explaining benefits of upcoming workshops to be organised in all departments to be taught in first year of the medical college, she said, “We are likely to invite stakeholders to this workshop, who will be beneficial for us in their submissions of suggestions.”
She informed that some professors have joined after following due procedures and a building with 12 units has been hired to house them.
“With all these preparations going on, we expect that the courses should be advertised sometime in June-July end,” Lyngdoh said.
Meanwhile, committees have been formed to prepare a strategy as to how to respond to queries on procedures of application, fee structure, etc., she said.
“I will have all of this information, likely, by April end,” she added.