The Central Institute of Indian Medicine, the regulatory authority for education in traditional medicine may soon derecognize degrees of thousands of students of Indian medicine in the state medical university. On Tuesday, CIIM officials said they would write to the Tamil Nadu Dr MGR Medical University asking it to withdraw the revisions it had brought into the syllabus for Siddha, Ayurveda and Unani courses this academic year. “The university has tampered with the syllabus and removed the allopathic contents. We have written to the university asking it to reverse this within two weeks or face derecognition of Indian medicine courses,” said CIIM vice-president Dr Stanley Jones. On Tuesday, Indian Siddha Medical Graduates Association president Dr Selvin Innocent Dhas complained to the CCIM president saying that the university had deleted subjects such as systemic pharmacology from post-graduate courses. The council convened an emergency meeting to decide on the course of action. “Earlier, the CCIM had received complaints that the syllabus was revised despite protests from members of the university’s standing academic board and the board of studies. We have letters from officials of the academic board. Students who study the new syllabus would not have completed the course as they don’t know many things we have recommended for them. We will derecognise the course if it doesn’t complete the reversal,” said Jones. State medical university vice-chancellor Dr Mayil Vahanan Natarajan said the university had decided to bring in the changes only after discussing the issue in detail. “If colleges have a problem we don’t mind de-affiliating them. It is unfair to tell the university not to revise the syllabus. That is a part of the university’s job,” he said. The issue isn’t new. Last year, the university withdrew similar changes to the syllabus after the CCIM warned it of derecognition. Senior siddha practitioners said they were planning to go on strike and petition the government about the revision. “The CCIM had said we should learn a bit of modern medicine because we use some allopathic drugs for our own treatment. For instance, when we are do minor surgeries, we may require anesthesia drugs. These aren’t available in traditional medicine. When the regulator authority thinks it is good for us to learn, how can the university change it,” asked Dr Dhas.
Source : The Times Of India