On Monday, a meeting took place between MCI representatives led by Ketan Desai, State Health Minister Surya Kant Mishra and officials of the State Health Department at Swastha Bhawan in Salt Lake.

The government expressed its inability to acquire 25 acres of single plot land for new medical colleges.

“According to MCI norms 25 acre of land in a single plot is mandatory for setting up a new medical college. However, we are facing difficulty in getting the land both on Kalyani and Malda. We asked the MCI representatives for possible relaxations in the norms, so that we can set up the new medical colleges,” said a senior officer of the state Health Department.

According to the sources, the state government gave recommendations to the MCI to divide the land into two or more multiple plots located closely. One of the proposals also asked for permission for horizontal expansion of buildings, instead of conforming to the land requirements. Another point which was discussed in the meeting was the lack of teaching faculties for different subjects including physiology and anatomy.

The state health department also asked MCI to increase the number of post graduate seats in different subjects like forensic state medicine, psychiatry and orthopedics. It also proposed fresh post graduate courses at new medical college hospital and increase in the seats where the courses already exist.

“The MCI representatives agreed on principle to our recommendations. Regarding relaxation on land availability, they stated that a proposal is already placed with the Health Ministry, which will give the final nod. Similar recommendations for norm relaxations were forwarded by the state government earlier,” said a senior officer of the State Health Department.