BSc nursing students in a fix

Bhanu P Lohumi

Tribune News Service

Shimla, October 28

A case against a nursing college in Una by the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau for admitting students to BSc nursing course has created panic among the students of the college.

The course is not recognised by the Nursing Council of India (NCI).

The students are in a quandary as their full one year and money will be wasted if the NCI did not grant post de facto recognition for the course for 2014-15.

Pankaj Lalit, Registrar, Himachal Pradesh University, said the BSc nursing course of the college was not recognised by the NCI, but the college produced some documents which appeared to be fake.

He said the university had reported the matter to the police.

He said he had filed a complaint against the college two weeks ago after the matter surfaced during the counselling for admissions for 2015-16 batch.

He alleged that the institute had admitted students without the renewal of recognition from the NCI during the previous year as well.

Besides NCI, the main responsibility to implement the directions and guidelines of the statutory bodies vested in the university, but it did not bother to confirm from the website of the NCI last year that whether the recognition of the institution for BSc nursing course had been renewed or not.

A principal of a nursing college said had the university acted in time and not allowed the institution to make admissions, the future of the students who took admission in the course would have been saved.

There is no mechanism with the university to conduct regular inspections before allowing admissions and the detailed information about the nursing colleges have also not been posted in the website of the university.

There are 18 private nursing colleges, 72 BEd colleges and around six private dental colleges affiliated with Himachal Pradesh University.