NEW DELHI: The largest organisation of health professionals with disabilities in India has written to the Union Health Ministry on Wednesday, urging them to take “corrective action” to meet the Supreme Court directions in the just-released interim guidelines by the National Medical Commission (NMC) for admission of persons with baseline disability candidates (PwBD) in medical courses for the academic year 2025-26.
Doctors with Disabilities: Agents of Change, the largest pan-India group of health professionals with disabilities striving for social justice, wrote to the Director General of Health Services (DGHS), stating that if the apex court directions are not complied with, they will be “constrained to initiate appropriate legal proceedings, including but not limited to invoking the contempt jurisdiction of the SC.”
The NMC issued the guidelines on July 19, a day after this newspaper published that thousands of medical students with disabilities are in a dilemma as they are still awaiting the revised admission guidelines, as mandated by the Supreme Court in its various orders.
The letter highlighted point-by-point violations of the various directions of the apex court orders in the new interim guidelines, and suggested corrected actions to be taken.
Dr Vikrant Sirohi, who wrote to the DGHS on behalf of Doctors with Disabilities: Agents of Change, said, “We urge you to take immediate and time-bound corrective action to address the violations in the interim as well as the final guidelines, including expanding the number of medical boards to ensure the presence of at least one board in each state and Union Territory.”
At the moment, there are 16 medical board centres across 11 states.
He also said that the DGHS should issue a public schedule of training sessions for medical board members and provide documentary proof that such training is conducted by doctors with disabilities.
Although counselling started on July 21, the DGHS has not published a training schedule for members of the Disability Assessment Boards (DABs), in direct contravention of the SC mandate, he pointed out.
Also, no directive has been issued mandating the inclusion of a doctor with a disability on the medical boards constituted at each of the 16 designated centres.
The letter said the composition of these boards must be disclosed on the DGHS website to ensure transparency and uphold public trust in the assessment process.
They also urged the DGHS to constitute and notify the Appellate Medical Body under the aegis of the DGHS by judicial directions.
“To date, neither the NMC nor DGHS has constituted the appellate body as directed, thereby denying candidates with disabilities their right to seek redress and acting in defiance of explicit directions issued by the Supreme Court,” the letter added.
The organisation also said the DGHS should issue binding directions to the NMC and all medical colleges to operationalise and publicly disclose details of Enabling Units, accessible infrastructure, reasonable accommodations, and the Equal Opportunity Policy on their official websites.