By Express News Service

CHENNAI: In order to ensure more transparency in faculty attendance in medical colleges, the Medical Council of India is going ahead with the process of installing biometric fingerprint attendance machine linked to the teaching-faculty’s Aadhaar number.

The process which is being carried out in full swing in Kanniyakumari Medical College is nearing completion, according to officials.

“We gave our Aadhaar number and with those details, the biometric details are stored. The work is nearing completion. It is installed in all medical college campus for doctors to prevent fake attendance and showing the same faculty in two institutions during Medical Council of India’s college inspection for approval of medical seats every year ,” a senior doctor said.

The Medial Council of India had made it mandatory for faculties to link their Aadhaar number and biometric record of faculties in medical colleges for Online Faculty Attendance Monitoring System (OFAMOS).

A section of government doctors associations had opposed the proposal initially.However, the MCI is determined to go ahead with the proposal in Tamil Nadu also.

Speaking to Express, A Edwin Joe, Director of Medical Education, said, “Medical Council of India has made it mandatory for doctors at medical colleges. It outsourced the work to an agency, which is executing the work. It is implementing in a phased manner and in a year’s time, it must be getting over.” He said the works were being directly monitored by the MCI officials.

According to MCI notification, the machines will be installed in all medical colleges for capturing faculty attendance, using OFAMOS under the Digital Mission Mode Project (DMMP) of the council. The central application shall have the connectivity with Aadhaar platform of UIDAI for verification. A convenient room with basic infrastructure for carrying out registration process of faculty for OFAMOS are provided by medical colleges.

Meanwhile, Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital is installing biometric attendance for all regular staff.