The Case of the Vanishing Professors: Ghost Faculty and Deans Haunting Medical Colleges

Picture this: a bustling medical college, stethoscopes dangling, white coats flapping, and students eagerly awaiting their next lecture. The timetable says Dr. Sharma’s anatomy class is up, but when the students arrive, the lecture hall is eerily empty. No Dr. Sharma. No notes on the board. Just a faint whiff of antiseptic and… is that the ghostly echo of a lecture never given? Welcome to the spooky world of ghost faculty and ghost deans in medical colleges, where the only thing scarier than a pop quiz is a professor who exists only on paper.

What’s a Ghost Faculty, Anyway?

Ghost faculty are the academic equivalent of Bigfoot—rumored to exist, occasionally spotted, but rarely caught in the act. These are professors or senior residents listed on a medical college’s roster, often with impressive credentials, who mysteriously vanish when it’s time to teach. They might appear just long enough to sign an attendance sheet during an inspection by the National Medical Commission (NMC) or the erstwhile Medical Council of India (MCI), only to float away to their private clinics or, in some cases, other colleges where they’re also listed as faculty. It’s like academic double-dipping, but with higher stakes and worse consequences.

The NMC’s 2022-23 assessment of 246 medical colleges revealed a chilling truth: a majority had ghost faculty, with none meeting the 50% attendance requirement. Some colleges didn’t even bother employing the required faculty at all, relying on these spectral scholars to pad their numbers during inspections. Imagine a college claiming Dr. Gupta teaches cardiology, but Dr. Gupta’s busy running his private heart clinic three cities away, only swooping in to mark his presence like a phantom signing a guestbook.

Enter the Ghost Deans: The Administrative Apparitions

If ghost faculty are the foot soldiers of this academic underworld, ghost deans are the shadowy overlords. These are administrators who, on paper, helm prestigious medical colleges but are rarely seen in the dean’s office. They might countersign faculty declarations or approve budgets from afar, but their actual presence on campus is as elusive as a straight answer in a bureaucracy. In some cases, deans have been implicated in signing off on false declarations, enabling the ghost faculty charade to continue. The MCI’s 2019 push for a digital registry aimed to pin down these elusive figures, requiring deans to verify faculty details through a login system. Yet, like trying to trap a ghost with a butterfly net, enforcement has been spotty.

The Haunting Impact on Students

For students, the ghost faculty phenomenon is less amusing than it sounds. Imagine signing up for a medical degree, paying hefty fees, and finding out your professor is a no-show. Postgraduate students, in particular, suffer when senior faculty are absent, leaving them to run hospital wards with minimal supervision. It’s like being handed the keys to a spaceship and told, “Good luck, figure it out!” The NMC noted that emergency medicine departments are particularly ghostly, with students avoiding them because there’s no one to teach them—except maybe the overworked casualty medical officer, who’s probably wondering why they signed up for this gig.

And then there’s the ripple effect. Ghost faculty contribute to a faculty shortage crisis, with states like Telangana reporting a 50% deficit and West Bengal missing 5,000 professors. This isn’t just a paperwork problem—it’s a quality-of-education crisis that could churn out underprepared doctors. As one health minister put it, “If the quality standards in medical education decline, it will endanger the lives of the people.” No pressure, future doctors!

Why Do These Ghosts Exist?

So, why do medical colleges summon these academic apparitions? It’s a mix of desperation and loopholes. To get accredited, colleges must meet strict faculty-to-student ratios and infrastructure standards. But hiring full-time, qualified professors is expensive, and many doctors prefer the lucrative world of private practice. Enter the ghost faculty: a quick fix to pass inspections without the long-term commitment. Some colleges even resort to “rent-a-faculty,” where doctors are paid to show up just for the day of an NMC or MCI visit, like academic stunt doubles.

Then there’s the issue of oversight. Surprise inspections, mandated by the Delhi High Court, are supposed to keep colleges honest, but whispers persist that some institutions get tip-offs, allowing them to stage a full cast of faculty and even fake patients for the day. It’s like a haunted house attraction, but instead of jump scares, you get jumpy administrators scrambling to cover their tracks.

The Exorcism Efforts

The NMC and MCI have been trying to banish these ghosts for years, with mixed success. In 2019, the MCI introduced a digital registry to track faculty, requiring deans to submit detailed records and biometric attendance. By 2024, the NMC upped the ante, mandating 75% attendance for senior faculty, banning private practice during college hours, and slapping non-compliant colleges with a ₹1 crore fine. They’ve even leaned on AI and Aadhaar-enabled biometric systems to ensure faculty aren’t just apparitions on a payroll.

But like any good ghost story, the spirits are stubborn. Colleges still find ways to game the system, and the faculty shortage—exacerbated by rapid expansion of medical colleges—means the temptation to employ ghosts remains. As one official lamented, “The rural hospitals are worst hit due to this. If the government is planning to increase the number of medical colleges with the existing infrastructure, it will just hamper the quality of medical education.”

A Lighthearted Haunting?

Let’s lighten the mood with a bit of gallows humor. Imagine a medical student, bleary-eyed from studying, stumbling into a lecture hall expecting wisdom from the legendary Dr. Rao, only to find a PowerPoint presentation running on autopilot, looping “Anatomy 101” like a cursed artifact. Or picture a dean’s office with a dusty nameplate reading “Dr. Phantom, Dean,” where the only sign of life is a coffee mug that’s been cold since 2015. Students might joke about their professors being “out of body” or “teaching from the other side,” but the reality is less chuckle-worthy when you realize your future surgeon might’ve been trained by a ghost.

The Path to a Ghost-Free Future

To truly exorcise these academic specters, medical colleges need more than digital registries and hefty fines. Competitive salaries, job security, and incentives for rural postings could lure real, live professors back to the classroom. Regular, unannounced inspections—without the courtesy heads-up—would keep colleges on their toes. And maybe, just maybe, we could invest in training programs to churn out more qualified faculty, so colleges don’t have to resort to spectral staffing.

Until then, the ghost faculty and deans will continue to haunt India’s medical education system, drifting through lecture halls and inspection reports like academic poltergeists. So, the next time you hear about a brilliant professor who’s never around or a dean who’s more myth than manager, don’t be surprised. It’s just another day in the haunted halls of medical college, where the only thing scarier than a ghost is the thought of graduating without proper training.

Sources: National Medical Commission reports, Times of India, The Hindu, Medical Dialogues