The Education Ministry has written to the Supreme Court (SC) for vacation of the latter's interim order to the Tribhuvan University (TU) to not immediately revoke the affiliation given to Kathmandu National Medical College.
The executive council of TU on September 6 had revoked the affiliation given to Kathmandu National Medical College after a three-member monitoring team formed by the council found that the medical college did not meet any standard.
A single bench of Justice Dambar Bahadur Shahi hearing the writ filed by promoter of the medical college Jainuddin Ansari on October 17 had issued an interim order to the TU directing it to not immediately revoke affiliation. Joint Secretary at the ministry Hari Lamsal told Setopati that it wrote to the Apex Court on Tuesday requesting for vacation of the interim order.
The ministry earlier on November 1 had written to the Nepal Medical Council (NMC) to recognize affiliation to the medical college citing the interim order. The letter implied that NMC should fix the number of seats for Kathmandu National Medical College for the upcoming session.
The ministry's letter seeking allocation of seats for the medical college, that does not meet any standard, was widely condemned. Dr Govinda KC, whose struggle for medical education reforms forced the TU to revoke the medical college's affiliation, had slammed the ministry's letter. "How much money did you take to write the letter?" Dr KC had asked Education Minister Gopal Man Shrestha over the phone.
The ministry has now written to the SC for vacation under intense public pressure.
The TU had revoked the affiliation after the monitoring team submitted its report to the council stating that the medical college did not meet any standard and the hospital was operated illegally.
The TU executive council on July 27 had provided affiliation to the medical college. The act of providing affiliation to a desolate hospital, that had not met any standard and did not even have permission from the Health Ministry, had invited widespread criticism. The executive council had put affiliation on hold on September 2 following the widespread criticism, and had formed a three-member monitoring team.
The monitoring team earlier on September 6 had gone to Ghattekulo for monitoring and inspection of teaching hospital of the medical college where it did not find any doctor, administration staffers and patients.
The team led by Sanat Devkota following investigations, and field inspection had concluded that National does not qualify to become a medical college.
The team members did not even find any administration staffer in the desolate building to hand over the letter to, and had left the premises handing over the letter to security guards.
