Despite a high number of MBBS seats, Telangana faces gaps in rural healthcare due to the concentration of medical colleges and faculty in urban areas. District medical colleges continue to experience staff and infrastructure shortages, affecting medical training and patient care. Balanced distribution of resources remains essential.
India has expanded undergraduate medical education rapidly over the past decade. Telangana reflects this trend, with a relatively high number of MBBS seats compared to its population. However, recent observations from a TOI report highlight that the geographical concentration of medical colleges and MBBS seats in urban areas, particularly around Hyderabad, continues to affect healthcare delivery in rural districts.
This imbalance was highlighted in December 2025 following discussions involving the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare and reports from medical associations.
The issue directly affects medical students, teaching faculty, rural hospitals, and patients living in the district and semi-urban areas of Telangana. While Hyderabad hosts a dense cluster of government and private medical colleges, many district medical colleges struggle with limited faculty strength and infrastructure.
Rural populations depend heavily on district hospitals attached to medical colleges for secondary-level care, including maternal health services, emergency surgeries, and pediatric care.
Telangana has over 9,000 MBBS seats, split almost evenly between government and private institutions. On paper, the state exceeds the national average in doctor training capacity per population. However, experts note that seat numbers alone do not translate into equitable healthcare access.
Several newer medical colleges established in the district headquarters face challenges related to:
Inadequate faculty appointments
Limited specialist availability
Restricted clinical exposure for students
Medical colleges serve two essential roles: training doctors and providing healthcare services. When colleges in rural areas function below capacity, both education and patient care suffer.
Faculty recruitment remains a major concern. Doctors often prefer urban postings due to better professional growth opportunities, higher income potential, and access to advanced healthcare facilities. As a result, rural colleges face persistent vacancies in both teaching and specialist positions.
National data consistently show shortages of specialists, such as surgeons, obstetricians, anesthetists, and pediatricians at the Community Health Centre (CHC) level, which forms the backbone of rural secondary care.
Limited faculty strength affects the quality of undergraduate medical training, as students receive less supervised clinical exposure. This reduces confidence and preparedness to work independently after graduation, especially in rural settings.
From a healthcare perspective, understaffed teaching hospitals struggle to provide continuous services. Patients are often referred to urban tertiary centers for conditions that could otherwise be managed locally, increasing both financial burden and treatment delays.
Health policy experts emphasize that correcting regional imbalance requires more than increasing MBBS seats. Suggested measures include:
Timely recruitment of qualified teaching faculty
Incentives for rural postings, including financial and career benefits
Strengthening hospital infrastructure attached to district medical colleges
Ensuring strict compliance with NMC standards
The uneven distribution of MBBS seats and medical resources highlights a structural challenge in India’s healthcare system. While Telangana has made progress in expanding medical education, balanced development of faculty, infrastructure, and clinical services remains essential to ensure that rural populations receive accessible and reliable healthcare.
(Rh/SS/MSM)
