National Medical Commission
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Contents |
Introduction
Replaced Medical Council of India
Sushmi Dey, September 26, 2020: The Times of India
Signalling a major reform, India’s new medical education regulator, the National Medical Commission (NMC), came into force, abolishing the 87-year-old Medical Council of India, which was tainted by corruption in its later years.
The Centre has notified the 33-member NMC, which will be chaired for three years by Suresh Chandra Sharma, retired HoD, ENT, AIIMS, New Delhi, while Dr Rakesh Kumar Vats, ex-secretary general, Board of Governors MCI, has been appointed as the secretary of the NMC for a similar tenure. The NMC, which aims to make the regulator’s functions well defined and accountable, will have four autonomous boards to regulate undergraduate medical education, postgraduate medical education, medical assessment and ratings, and ethics and medical registration.
The commission will also frame policies to implement the new legislation — National Medical Commission Act 2019 — passed by Parliament last year to reform the medical education sector.
The key provisions of the NMC Act, 2019, includes fee regulation on 50% seats in private medical colleges and deemed universities and commencement of final-year MBBS exam as a National Exit Text (NEXT), which will serve as a licentiate exam for entrance to postgraduate medical courses and as a screening test for foreign medical graduates.
Students will be able to get admission to seats in all medical colleges and to institutes of national importance like AIIMS, PGI Chandigarh and JIPMER through a single counselling process.The Act does not impose any restriction on the number of attempts for NEXT. Enactment of the NMC will also end inspections for college registration renewals.
The NMC will make guidelines for a new cadre of non-MBBS mid-level health service providers such as nursing practitioners and pharmacists with limited rights to dispense medicines.
As an appellate authority
2020- 2026 Jan: Appeals by Patients not considered
Rema.Nagarajan, January 28, 2026: The Times of India
In response to a Right to Information application, National Medical Commission (NMC) has revealed it has taken up 185 appeals by doctors against state medical councils’ decisions from its inception in Sept 2020 till Jan 2026, while it has returned 256 appeals filed by patients in the same period.
Recently, health ministry had asked the commission to consider hearing appeals filed by patients and/or their relatives against state council rulings on alleged negligence by doctors. Responding to a complaint by an RTI activist and ophthalmologist Dr KV Babu, who has been following up the issue of patients’ appeals being rejected, policy division of health ministry asked NMC to “take necessary action in accordance with the law”. In his complaint, Dr Babu urged the ministry to take action against NMC members who took “an illegal decision” in 2021 to return appeals filed by patients claiming that NMC Act did not allow them to appeal.
In Oct 2021, NMC’s Ethics and Medical Registration Board (EMRB) had decided that in keeping with NMC Act, 2019, “only medical practitioners or professionals should be allowed as (sic) appeals before EMRB”. Section 30(3) of NMC Act states that medical professionals aggrieved by state council decisions can appeal. Though nothing in the section expressly bars patients from filing appeals, EMRB inserted the word “only” medical practitioners into its reading of the section in its Oct 2021 meeting.
“Ever since NMC was formed, they have been rejecting, on average, one patient appeal every week, 256 rejections in more than five years. There is no explicit provision in NMC Act which bars the hearing of appeals from the public. If anything, the act clearly mandates that NMC is to adopt earlier statutory provisions of MCI. Rejecting patient appeals has been illegal right from the start. Moreover, in 2024, in the 16th meeting of NMC it was agreed that all appeals received by EMRB will be entertained. However, EMRB has continued to reject appeals coming to it,” said Dr Babu.
The draft amendment of NMC Act put in public domain by health ministry in Dec 2022 contains a provision that explicitly provides for the public to file appeals before NMC’s EMRB against decisions of state councils in complaints related to medical negligence or professional misconduct. A file noting acquired using RTI showed that the amendment was approved in 2023. However, the file hasn’t moved since then.
NMC dismisses all patients’ appeals, claims only doctors can appeal, though this is against the law/ 2025
Rema Nagarajan, August 4, 2025: The Times of India
Responding to a question in Parliament on whether National Medical Commission (NMC) is biased towards doctors, health ministry has stated that the ethics regulation of 2002 provides for complaints against them.
Referring to NMC Act that states doctors can file appeals against decisions of state medical councils, the panel’s ethics section has been dismissing all appeals filed by patients, claiming only doctors can file appeals, even though it is against the law.
The Act clearly states that “rules and regulations made under Indian Medical Council Act, 1956, shall continue to be in force and operate till new standards or requirements are specified under this Act or the rules and regulations made thereunder”. Since the Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2002, has not been replaced, it still stands.
All 162 appeals of patients have been rejected by NMC since 2019
Clause 8.8 of the 2002 ethics regulation states, “Any person aggrieved by the decision of the State Medical Council on any complaint against a delinquent physician, shall have the right to file an appeal to MCI within 60 days from the date of receipt of the order passed by the said medical council”.
Yet, all 162 appeals of patients have been rejected by NMC since 2019.
In the reply in Parliament, Union minister of state for health Anupriya Patel stated that “to ensure that the NMC functions in a transparent and fair manner”, the central govt appoints the chairperson and presidents of four autonomous boards as per the NMC Act, 2019. However, there is no transparency as even the minutes of meetings of the NMC and its autonomous boards are not available in the public domain, as used to be the case with the erstwhile Medical Council of India.
Moreover, all autonomous boards, including the posts of presidents, are currently almost entirely vacant, with govt having failed to make appointments for over 10 months. The few minutes of the commission’s meetings accessed using RTI show that most non-doctor ex-officio members hardly ever attend meetings and, hence, most decisions are taken by commission members, almost most of whom are doctors. Of the 33-member commission, about 20 are doctors.
“I have complained to the health ministry and the law ministry by registered post about NMC rejecting patient appeals and hence I have proof. So, the health ministry cannot claim to have not received any complaints,” said Gokul Aneja, husband of a victim of alleged medical negligence, who appealed against the decision of the Punjab state medical council, only to have his appeal rejected twice.
Logo
2023
Hindu god takes place of nat’l emblem in NMC logo
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
New Delhi : The National Medical Commission (NMC) has modified its logo, dropping the national emblem and including the photo of Dhanvantri — an avatar of Lord Vishnu who is referred to as the god of Ayurveda in the Puranas.
The NMC said the Dhanvantri logo was in use for almost a year. “Earlier, it was in black and white and, therefore, not visible in printouts. We have simply used a colour photo in the centre of the logo,” an official said.
Another official, who did not want to be identified, said even the WHO’s emblem consisted of the United Nations’ symbol overlain by a staff with a snake coiling around it. The staff and snake has long been a symbol of medicine and the medical profession. WHO says it originates from the story of Asclepius, who was revered by the ancient Greeks as a god of healing and whose cult involved the use of snakes.
The NMC logo has no mention of ‘India’ but has used the term ‘Bharat’. Notably, there was no official announcement on the logo change. The change in logo was criticised by the Indian Medical Association’s Kerala chapter. “The recent change in the NMC logo is not acceptable to the modern medical fraternity. The new logo gives a wrong message and will harm the scientific and secular nature of the commission,” it said in a statement, adding that the move should be rescinded.
Dr Sharad Kumar Aggarwal, national president of IMA, said they would discuss the matter in a meeting scheduled on Sunday and then issue a statement.
Last week, the health ministry had issued directives that Ayushman BharatHealth and Wellness Centres will now be known as Ayushman Arogya Mandir. The ministry said it had sent a letter to states and Union Territories to implement the rebranding exercise. States have also been asked to upload photographs of rebranded primary health facilities on the Ayushman Bharat-Health and Wellness Centres (AB-HWC) portal. The rebranded AB-HWCs will also have a new tagline — ‘Arogyam Parmam Dhanam’, the ministry said.
