Bhopal, July 19 (IANS) Madhya Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Rajendra Shukla has claimed that around 20 per cent of first-year college students studying in the Medical Science University (MSU) at Jabalpur have opted for Hindi to write their semester exams.

“This batch will complete four-year medical course in Hindi medium in 2027-28. Medical Science University, Jabalpur, has also informed that separate questions papers (Hindi and English) for students would be provided from the next semester exam,” the Deputy Chief Minister said.

Shukla, who is also heading the Health and Medical Education Department of Madhya Pradesh, told IANS that he has directed all government medical colleges to encourage more students to opt for Hindu to write their semester exams for medical courses.

“All government medical colleges have been directed to make full arrangements to provide theoretical as well as practical classes for Hindi medium students. They should not face any problem during their classes. There may be some problem as this is a beginning stage, but the statement is committed to provide all possible help for students,” he added.

Shukla made this claim amid news coming that MBBS studies in Hindi, introduced in Madhya Pradesh three years ago with much fanfare, seems to have hardly enthused the students in the government medical colleges in the state, with few found to have opted the language to write their semester exams.

He also told that the state government has recently announced that incentives such as reduction of examination by 50 per cent will be given to the students who will pursue MBBS courses in Hindi.

MSU, Jabalpur, is also going to organise a workshop on July 22 in which the students and the faculty members in the medical colleges will be encouraged to highlight their problems they are facing relating to the MBBS course in Hindi and they will be sorted out.

Notably, Madhya Pradesh is the first state in the country to have introduced the MBBS course in Hindi language under the National Education Policy (NEP) in 2022.

Hindi medium course was first introduced at Gandhi Medical College (GMC), Bhopal.

At the same time, a war room named ‘Mandhar’, which was set up in 2022, and around 100 doctors with different specialties have been deployed to do translation work from English to Hindi textbooks.

The books for the MBBS courses are being translated from English to Hindi and made available to the medical colleges for the students, keen to pursue the MBBS studies in Hindi.

A faculty member in the state government-run Gandhi Medical College said that the MBBS students are taught in ‘Hinglish’ (Hindi and English languages) and the MBBS books translated into Hindi from English have also many English terms written in Hindi alphabets.

–IANS

pd/khz