Lancet flags bribery, ghost faculty in private medical colleges in India

A recent Lancet report has highlighted a major corruption scandal in India’s medical education system, with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) uncovering widespread bribery and collusion between government officials and private medical colleges.

In May 2025, the CBI filed a First Information Report (FIR) alleging that officials from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the National Medical Commission (NMC) leaked confidential inspection schedules and regulatory requirements to intermediaries.

These intermediaries enabled private colleges to manipulate inspections by employing fake faculty, falsifying patient records and bribing inspectors for favourable compliance reports.

The FIR named more than 30 persons, including eight Health Ministry officials, a former NMC Joint Director, a former University Grants Commission chairman and NMC-assigned doctors, the Lancet report noted.

A key case cited by the CBI involved the Shri Rawatpura Sarkar Institute of Medical Sciences and Research in Nava Raipur, where officials and inspectors allegedly exchanged bribes amounting to Rs 50 to 60 lakh.

“Such prior disclosure enabled medical colleges to orchestrate fraudulent arrangements, including the bribing of assessors to secure favourable inspection reports, deployment of non-existent proxy faculty (ghost faculty) and the admission of fictitious patients to artificially project compliance during inspections,” said the FIR.

Dr Abhay Shukla, a public health professional and the national co-convenor of Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, explained, “Private medical colleges, charging Rs 20 lakh or more annually, falsify hospital operations and faculty rosters. On inspection days, they hire proxy faculty and pay people to pose as patients, exploiting weak oversight.”

Since the 1980s, private medical education has become a lucrative industry in India. Unlike countries where it is strictly non-profit, students in India pay up to Rs 1 crore for an MBBS degree.

Prof Dileep Mavalankar, former director of the Indian Institute of Public Health in Gandhinagar said, “In the private sector, there is a lot of money to be made.”

He explained how this is not a new issue, but has been persistent for several years now. “They falsify patient records and show ghost faculty because it’s an industry driven by profit. The NMC’s inspection system lacks measurable checks, allowing manipulation,” he said.

He added, “This compromises training, producing underqualified doctors and endangering patient safety.”

In 2022, the Health Ministry said the doctor-population ratio in the country is 1:834; better than the WHO standard of 1:1000.

In March 2025, the government announced an addition of 10,000 MBBS seats and set a target of adding a total of 75,000 seats over the next five years. However, experts warn that this expansion is coming at the cost of quality in medical education. Dr Shukla explained that these hurried and unrealistic targets are leading to serious problems.

“What the government needs to do instead is increase its own spending and expand public medical colleges,” he said.

The NMC, which replaced the Medical Council of India in 2020, has faced criticism for centralised authority and inefficiencies, according to The Lancet. Its target of adding more MBBS seats over five years — often through public-private partnerships (PPPs) — has only worsened the situation.

Dr Shukla noted, “PPP-based colleges prioritise profit, undermining public health.” Prof Mavlankar added, “NMC’s norms are not easily measurable, enabling corruption.”

“Some faculty members only lend their names to the college records in exchange for payment, but never actually show up to teach,” he said.

The Tribune reached out to the Ministry of Health and NMC regarding these allegations, but they did not respond to the email queries. However, the NMC issued a press release on July 2 stating that it had taken strict action to uphold regulatory standards by blacklisting four assessors and denying seat renewals to six colleges for the 2025–26 academic year.

India’s health expenditure, at 1.5 per cent of GDP, lags behind the global 2.5 per cent norm, necessitating more public medical colleges.