Three IITs are building medical schools. The real target is not more doctors (opens the source in a new tab)
- IIT Kharagpur, Madras and Kanpur are building medical schools, but their directors say they want ‘physician-engineers’, not more doctors.
- Kanpur will start with MD, DM and MCh degrees; its 500-bed hospital is due to be inaugurated by the end of this year, with the first patient by March 2027. Madras plans MBBS, MD and PhD; Kharagpur has a hospital and approval for postgraduate courses. None has graduated a doctor yet.
- Imports are about 60% of India’s medical-device consumption: roughly ₹1.37 lakh crore (~$8.8bn) in 2024-25, against exports of ₹42,360 crore.
- ~60%
- of devices imported
- $8.8bn
- device imports, FY25
- 60
- new faculty, Kanpur
Why it matters Hybrid skills aim to cut India’s reliance on imported devices.
Other side Kharagpur’s director says success is a product made in India, validated, deployed at scale and improving outcomes, not papers, patents or start-ups. A teaching hospital and NMC approval are mandatory and take years, so the model will take a while to judge.
Source:India Today (free to read) ↗