NEW DELHI: Only 1,800, or just 0.05% of the Registered Medical Practitioners (RMPs), who had applied for the government’s much-publicised National Medical Register (NMR), have been issued the certificates in the last two years, as per the NMC’s minutes of the meetings.
As many as 30,000 applications for RMPs are pending verification with the State Medical Councils (SMCs) and the National Medical Commission (NMC), according to the January 7, minutes accessed by this paper.
At the 17th meeting of the Commission, which was chaired by its Chairman, Dr Abhijat Chandrakant Sheth, members expressed concern about “slow progress” in the registration process and suggested constituting a committee to recommend solutions and expedite the entire process of updating the NMR.
It also mentioned that detailed deliberations are needed regarding NMR, a centralised database of registered medical practitioners in modern medicine in the country.
Discussing progress in operationalising NMC’s NMR portal, the minutes said that “operational challenges were reported for slow progress due to voluntary enrolment, data inconsistencies between State Medical Registers and NMR, and technical constraints affecting workflow efficiency”.
“These challenges are being examined, and measures are being planned to strengthen system functionality,” said the December 16, 2025, meeting attended by 33 members. Health Minister JP Nadda had in August 2024 launched the portal.
It was mandatory for RMPs, estimated to be 13.5 lakh as per Parliament reply of 2023, to register themselves. But after it failed to take off even after months, the Health Ministry announced in Parliament on August 8, 2025, in a written reply, that the initiative was now voluntary.