Jaipur: In a major escalation of tensions between senior medical administrators and the Rajasthan government, superintendents of 12 hospitals under SMS Medical College have collectively submitted their resignations to protest the newly imposed rules banning private practice for principals and superintendents of government medical colleges and their attached hospitals.
The resignations were tendered on Monday to the Secretary of the Medical Education Department through SMS Medical College Principal Dr. Deepak Maheshwari.
The doctors have opposed not only the prohibition on private practice but also the directive restricting principals and superintendents to spending no more than one-fourth of their work time on teaching duties as professors or senior professors. The protesting doctors have termed the new guidelines restrictive and harmful to academic functioning.
The Rajasthan government had announced last week that the move was aimed at ensuring smoother administration and improved availability of senior leadership in medical institutions. The guidelines apply to all government medical colleges and their affiliated hospitals.
To defuse the situation, Health Minister Gajendra Singh Khimsar urgently summoned the superintendents for a meeting within an hour of receiving their resignations. However, discussions remained inconclusive. Another meeting has been scheduled at SMS Medical College on Tuesday in an attempt to resolve the deadlock, according to a Times of India report.
The Rajasthan Medical College Teachers’ Association (RMCTA) had earlier submitted a memorandum to Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma, calling the government’s guidelines “arbitrary and biased.” The association argued that the restrictions undermine both administrative autonomy and teaching responsibilities.
The controversy has also triggered sharp reactions from the medical fraternity. An Executive Member of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), Rajasthan Chapter, posted on X:
“This is unprecedented. All Medical Superintendents of SMS Medical College have collectively resigned in support of RMCTA against the latest orders of the Medical Education Department. But when it comes to junior doctors, seniors rarely show the same solidarity. If unity is to be preserved, it must be shown everywhere — otherwise, soon the bureaucracy will dominate entirely.”
With Tuesday’s meeting expected to be crucial, the standoff has brought administrative functioning across SMS Medical College hospitals under uncertainty, even as the state government maintains that the new rules are essential for improving governance in the medical education sector.
