The Prime Minister's Office has asked the HRD ministry to bring it under the purview of the proposed National Council for Higher Education and Research (NCHER). At present, the medical and agriculture education is excluded from the NCHER Bill. Inclusion of medical education in NCHER will mean that health ministry's proposal to set up a regulatory authority for medical education is likely to be shelved.
A reason for inclusion of medical education in the proposed NCHER is that the National Accreditation Regulatory Authority For Higher Educational Institutions Bill, 2010 provides for accreditation of higher educational institutions, including medical colleges. One of the other proposed HRD Bills, Prohibition of Unfair Practices Bill, accounts for malpractices in medical colleges. On May 3, 2010 both the Bills were introduced in the LS by HRD Minister Kapil Sibal. Sibal is planning to go on a retreat with experts like former NCERT director Krishna Kumar, Devesh Kapur of Pennsylvania University, educationist Vinod Raina, Pratap Bhanu Mehta of Centre for Policy Research, historian KN Pannikar and others for further consultations on NCHER.
