The moral clout that Dr Govinda KC commands from people from all walks of life was evident on Monday as the orthopedic surgeon at the Institute of Medicine, Maharajgunj, was successfully persuaded by members of the civil society against starting his eighth fast-unto-death. At their urging Dr KC has postponed his fasting, which was supposed to start on Monday. Now the government has been given a fresh two-week ultimatum to withdraw the parliamentary bill for the formation of Manmohan Memorial Institute of Health Sciences and to implement past agreements with Dr KC. If not, the civil society actors have threatened to join Dr KC's protest. This kind of broad public support for the noble cause of Dr KC—from former bureaucrats, educators, medical doctors, senior journalists, cine artists—had been foreseen by Kedar Bhakta Mathema, head of the high-level taskforce set up to recommend reform in medical education. "Enough is enough," said Mathema during a recent interview with Republica."It is not right to let the frail doctor shoulder the fight against the mighty medical mafia all by himself.""You just wait and see," Mathema cautioned, "this time the whole society will come out in support of Dr KC." And they have. For they see the effort of the Oli government to grant a private body the right to run a parallel medical establishment, without any government oversight, as blatant abuse of executive authority. They realize that if the parliament passes this bill, it could be the death knell of the kind of affordable and easily-accessible medical institutions for common Nepalis that Dr KC envisions. Thankfully, it's not all bad news. In line with Dr KC's demands, the Cabinet on Friday formed a Medical Education Commission to devise, within the next six months, a new medical education policy by stepping on earlier recommendations of Mathema-led taskforce. Dr KC welcomed this development. He has been saying all along that affiliations for new medical colleges should be granted, on need basis, only as advised by such a commission of experts. But the government seems bent on bypassing the new commission and granting 'one-off' affiliation to Manmohan institute through the back door.
To do so, the related bill has been forwarded to the parliament's Women, Senior Citizen and Social Welfare Committee among whose members are shareholders in the Manmohan institute! We urge the government to reconsider its misguided move to outsource medical education to a private company by railroading due process. Instead it should let the new Medical Education Commission do its work. The Oli government is already unpopular for its profligacy and active support of black-marketing. The only visible success of Prime Minister Oli, arguably, lies in his unique ability to whip up anti-India nationalism, even while he himself seems to be from behind the scenes working to India's benefit. (Otherwise, why have his much-hyped trade and fuel agreements with China failed to materialize?) Given these significant failures there could be serious political challenges to his government in the days ahead—if he is able to use his good judgment and survive Dr KC's moral challenge first.
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