Karnataka’s nursing students worried about job prospects 
 Tanu Kulkarni 
 
Bengaluru, December 07, 2017 00:00 IST


‘Hospitals will not hire us if we don’t have Council’s backing’

With the Indian Nursing Council (INC) removing the list of State nursing colleges from its website, fear has resurfaced among students who are once again anxious about job prospects outside Karnataka.

“Most of us studying in Karnataka are from other States. We want to go back to our home town for work. Many of us will also look for jobs abroad. Hospitals will not hire us if we do not have the backing of INC,” a nursing student told The Hindu .

On November 15, 2017, the Indian Nursing Council published a list of nursing colleges operational in States across the country.

However, it failed to include even a single college in Karnataka. This is the second time that the INC has removed its list of colleges from Karnataka from its website.

The first time this was done was in May 2017, following which nursing colleges approached the court.

The controversy began after the State government in December 2016 issued orders that the approval of INC was not required for nursing colleges in Karnataka. The order stated that approvals by the Karnataka Nursing College and the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) would suffice for colleges to run. It was following this that the INC removed a list of 257 colleges from its website.

A management member of the nursing college said that the differences between the State government and INC had led to the situation. “Both of them should amicably settle the issue in order to protect the interests of lakhs of students,” he said.

Another college principal pointed out that the INC was restrained from the publishing list of nursing institutes recognised by the Supreme Court. “Why are only colleges from Karnataka removed and not others,” she asked.

When contacted, INC authorities said that they had removed the list of colleges from Karnataka as the jurisdiction of these colleges is under the purview of the State government.