Medical faculty against appointment policy

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, February 20

The Punjab Cabinet decision to fill direct quota posts at government medical colleges in Amritsar and Patiala is being welcomed by a large number of aspirants, but it has not gone down well with senior faculty members already in service.

The senior faculty members stated that with direct recruitment, their students, who are now teachers at private medical colleges, may join as their seniors. While 75 per cent of seats for the seniors are required to be filled from the PCMS cadre through promotions, the remaining 25 per cent quota can be filled through direct recruitment.

“The direct quota appointments are a tool to ensure backdoor entry for kin and relatives of senior officials in the Punjab Medical Education Service (PMES) cadre. They have been working in private colleges where they reach to the position of associate professor within three or four years. On the other hand, a person at a government college is sometimes not promoted for 9-10 years. So in a way there are chances that a student may join at a senior position than his or her teachers,” said a senior faculty member.

The faculty reasoned that the long delay in holding of departmental promotion committee meetings in the past has adversely affected the promotional aspects of teachers at government medical colleges. “Private medical colleges are often liberal with promotions. So they automatically become eligible for a senior position even though they have less working experience than their counterparts in government colleges,” said another faculty member.