CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has observed that even after 70 years of independence, doctors continue to avoid serving in rural areas and several methods tried out by the government to convince them have proved futile.
Justice Pushpa Sathyanarayana made the observation while disposing of a batch of pleas moved by service candidates, seeking a direction to the Tamil Nadu government to declare their areas also as remote and difficult.
The court, which refused to interfere in the rank list released by the government for the 2019-20 academic year, directed the state to revisit the government order, declaring such areas as remote and difficult, based on objections made for the next academic year in the interest of PG course aspirants.
The court noted that though India has developed and modified health care in rural areas by setting up Primary Health Centres, many were without doctors or manned by nurses and paramedical staff or had one doctor and paramedical staff.
From these PHCs, patients are referred to district headquarters hospitals, which are supposed to have all facilities to manage at least 90 per cent of the cases, Justice Sathyanarayana said.
Noting that getting admission in a government medical college was a "Himalayan challenge", the judge said, "Like any other profession, a busy practice and an affluent life would be the dream of every medical student."
"Therefore, the rural practice is also becoming remote, especially in India, where we have our own native medicines like Siddha, Ayurveda and Naturopathy," the judge added.
The judge further noted that doctors in city-based multi-speciality hospitals/government hospitals are provided with multifarious equipment and depend on laboratory reports and said while there was no harm in using such facilities, doctors in these classified areas feel helpless as they get a little experience on clinical skills.