This story is from October 21, 2019

IIT Kharagpur to start MBBS course with 50 students in 2021-22

IIT Kharagpur is likely to roll out its ambitious MBBS programme with an initial intake capacity of 50 students from the 2021-2022 academic session. The OPD services in the 400-bed superspecialty hospital is likely to start by the end of the year. The hospital will be run on a cross-subsidy model in a not-for-profit mode.
IIT Kharagpur to start MBBS course with 50 students in 2021-22
Work on in full swing at the new hospital on IIT Kharagpur campus
KOLKATA: IIT Kharagpur is likely to roll out its ambitious MBBS programme with an initial intake capacity of 50 students from the 2021-2022 academic session. The OPD services in the 400-bed superspecialty hospital is likely to start by the end of the year.
Professor Sriman Kumar Bhattacharyya, the officiating director, said: “We plan to start the OPD services this year.
By early next year, we plan to start the indoor facilities in the first phase with 400 beds. Once the hospital is operational, we plan to roll out the MBBS curriculum as per MCI guidelines.”
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“The plan in the second phase is to scale it up to a 750-bed hospital and increase the intake capacity to 100 MBBS students,” Bhattacharyya added. He said, “IIT Kharagpur will award the MBBS and postgraduate degrees, chart out the curriculum and manage the academic affairs while the day-to-day hospital management will be run by the special purpose vehicle floated under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013. The hospital’s board of directors will be headed by the IIT Kharagpur director and will include senior IIT faculty.”
The hospital, he added, will be run on a cross-subsidy model in a not-for-profit mode. Sources said 10% of the beds would be free and 65% of the beds would be charged as per the rates in the central and state health insurance schemes.
Satadal Saha, project director, Dr B C Roy Super Speciality Hospital, said, “The intention is to create an entire ecosystem with a nursing college and a school to train paramedical and technical experts. We have been in consultation with AIIMS, Delhi and several other medical colleges in India and abroad. An MoU has already been signed with AIIMS, Delhi.” Saha added, “We want to draw in the best of talents from both within the country and outside.” He indicated that IIT Kharagpur had been exploring this idea since 2000 and in 2001, had set up the School of Medical Science and Technology to prepare researchers, who would fuse engineering with medicine.

The director said, “Traditionally in IITs, we first set up postgraduate departments. Once these are fully functional, we set up their undergraduate schools. But in medicine, we learnt, it must be the reverse. We need to introduce MBBS first and then offer postgraduate degrees. He added that health care data sciences or data analytics would also be one of the primary thrust areas as IIT ventures deeper into medical research.
The institute is also setting up mobile hospital units to cater to the immediate neighbourhood anticipating a heavy rush of people to the new hospital.
“Basic diagnostics and treatment will be done by these mobile units, which will reduce the patient load in the hospital,” Saha added.
IIT Kharagpur is not alone in this venture. IIT Kanpur, sources said, is also aiming at replicating this model with a 500-bed hospital of its own.
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