The return of hundreds of Indian medical students from war-ravaged Ukraine has posed another challenge: How will they complete their studies as prospects of peace look bleak as of now?
While the students — who number around 20,000 from India and about 1,000 from Punjab alone — are demanding that they should be accommodated in medical colleges in their respective states, Dr Navjot Dahiya, national vice-president of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), says that such a move is “technically and ethically impossible”.
“It will set a wrong precedent. Tomorrow anyone will visit a nation embroiled in conflict and escape from there to hold the government accountable for their medical studies,” says Dr Dahiya, adding that it would also be unfair to those students who opted for some other field after failing to clear the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET).
According to Dr Dahiya, war would not continue forever and the evacuated students could rejoin their universities in Ukraine at a later stage. As an alternative, he suggests the government could allow these students to continue with their medical studies at their present level after they clear the NEET.
Meanwhile, students returning from Ukraine say that though they have escaped Russian bombs and bullets, it is becoming difficult for them to escape the online trolls. The students say they are being subjected to criticism from all quarters for failing to clear the NEET and “escaping” to Ukraine to get a degree from a below-average medical college.
“Little do such critics know that many of the doctors in government and private medical sector have studied in Ukraine, while those who studied in India are heading to the USA and Europe,” says Nikhil Kalra, a fourth-year medical student who has returned from Ukraine.
Ludhiana-based Yashasvi Govind Rao, 21, a fourth-year student at Ternopil National Medical University in Ukraine, says: “The seats in government medical colleges are not enough and studying medicine in a private college in India costs around ₹1 crore. It costs less than half that amount, including the education fee, accommodation, food, etc, to get a similar degree in countries like Ukraine.”
Dr Arun Mitra, former senior vice-president of IMA, Punjab, blames the central government for the “exodus” of students as it failed to make medical education affordable for them in India.
Meanwhile, parents of evacuated students say they cannot take the risk of sending their children back to Ukraine. They also welcomed the National Medical Commission’s move to allow foreign medical graduates complete their internship in India, provided they clear the relevant examination.
Balwinder Singh, an electricity department employee whose son Simranpreet Singh is a fifth-year medical student in Kharkiv, says it is practically impossible to return to Ukraine. “After what my son had to go through, I cannot afford to take the risk of sending him back to Ukraine,” he says