The self-financing Ayurveda Colleges Management Association in Kerala (KISMA) has expressed concerns over the revised regulations introduced by the National Commission for Indian System of Medicine (NCISM) to assess and regulate the minimum standards and requirements (MSR) needed for the teaching institutions and attached hospitals in the country. The new MSR came into being on May 1, 2024. The association alleges that the national council has prepared the new MSR without holding comprehensive discussion with the stakeholders, but only considered the suggestions and opinions of a few Ayurveda academics from certain institutions. Although the draft was put on public domain for submitting proposals and suggestions, no announcement was made about it to invite the attention of the stakeholders, they said. The management further alleges that the NCISM demands for high tech facilities in all Ayush colleges and hospitals, which entail an investment of crores of rupees by the management. According to them, no Ayurveda or Unani or Siddha self-financing college in Kerala is operating profitably, but struggling too much to withstand. In the last three academic terms, the colleges even could not fill the total seats for the degree course (BAM). Talking about the new MSR, which replaces the MSR of 2016, the association said the new regulations affect the operations of the existing institutions also, and create difficulties for the college managements. They have already written to the chairman of the NCISM about their grievances, and are waiting for a favourable decision from the council. A representative of the association who spoke to Pharmabiz said, none of the institutions in Kerala is capable to comply with the regulations in terms of human resources, expansion of infrastructure facilities, land and hike in salaries to teaching and non-teaching staff. He said the regulations want the management to increase the number of teachers although there is no increase in the number of students. Similarly, 40 percent of the non-teaching staff should also be increased. The council stipulates 20 per cent increase in the number of teaching staff in every existing college. It says that the space in the OP department of the hospital and the seating capacity of the class rooms of the colleges must be expanded. State-of-the-art equipment should be set up in the laboratories, and skilled IT officers must be employed in the technical department. All these facilities are recommended on the lines of the modern medicine teaching institutions to justify that the standard of the Ayush academic institutions is going to be elevated into global standards. The management representative said all these are putting the institutions into quandary as these regulations are not economically viable as far as the institutions are concerned. Quoting high tech facilities as demanded by the council, he said all the institutions mandatorily need to install closed circuit television (CCTV) at places such as biometric attendance area, classrooms, library, digital library, laboratories, yogya clinical skill laboratory and examination hall, entrance and exits of college and hospital, out-patient department and inpatient department registration counter, out-patient department block, diagnostic zone, panchakarma, operation theatre, kriyakalpa section, anusastrakarma unit, labour theatre and at other places as per the institutional requirement. Further, the minimum configuration of cameras should be such that face and other details are clearly visible and the cameras should be capable of day and night recording. On the same lines, all the classrooms should be of information communication technology enabled, equipped with smart boards, audio-visual gadgets, internet connection or wi-fi facility and the like. Each classroom should be under the CCTV surveillance and the configuration of the camera is such that the students can be identifiable on magnification. The number of Ayurveda colleges in the state is 17, out of which three are under government sector, one each at Thiruvananthapuram, Thripunithura and Kannur. Barring two aided-colleges, Kottakkal and Vaidyaratnam, there are 12 private sector institutions that run undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Ayurveda (BAM and MD). A senior officer in the management of the colleges association, in anonymity, told Pharmabiz that for the last three years the colleges were facing difficulties in filling up the seats, about 40 percent of the total intake were unfilled. They hope for a positive turn this year as the NCISM has reduced the minimum cut off percentiles of NEET to enable the institutions to admit more students to the degree course. He expressed the hope that all the institutions in Kerala will be able to admit the total intake this year. The institutions are waiting for the third allotment this week. Although the institutions are happy with the reduction of minimum cut off percentiles to 149 from 164, they are unable to comply with the full norms of the new MSR, which was published on May 1, this year. He said the institutions have to submit a complaint report to the NCISM before December 31 to enable the national council to start inspections from January onwards. The management is concerned whether they will survive the ordeal of the inspection of the national council.
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