The growing pace of India’s healthcare infrastructure has thrust into the limelight the age-old assumption that has been challenged: students go abroad to pursue their medical degree due to the lack of infrastructure in India.
Foreign MBBS courses are a well-known shortcut for the past few decades, with thousands of Indian students who are barred by the cut-throat entrance process and scarcity of seats.
Foreign medical schools had gone from being an alternative in Eastern Europe to a dream in Southeast Asia, where they offered quick admissions and guarantees.
This was recently brought into question by Union Health Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda, as his statements reopened the discussion at the national level. Although asserting the fact that nobody can stop a student from pursuing education elsewhere in the world, the fact is that the issue of the "lack of infrastructure" in the country can't be used as an excuse anymore, according to him.
His observations come at a point when the Indian healthcare education sector is experiencing its most radical growth since Independence, where new medical colleges, hospitals, and seats for training are being introduced on a large scale.
However, the irony in all this does not seem easy to ignore. While official figures show increased strength in terms of capabilities as well as infrastructure, it has been noticed that students in India are looking outside the country in substantial numbers.
The true challenge, therefore, becomes less a matter of whether it has developed the infrastructure and more a function of whether drives for quality, affordability, access, and future prospects continue to outweigh this progress, or if the perception proves more recalcitrant than the policy itself.
GOVERNMENT'S CLAIM: A SYSTEM TRANSFORM
According to data highlighted by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, India is currently manufacturing 1.18 lakh MBBS doctors and 74,000 PG doctors annually, which is an enormous increase compared to the previous decade.
According to officials, the medical infrastructure within the country has been doubled in the last ten years through major investment in medical seats and medical systems.
This has been accompanied by development in the number of All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) establishments. Where India had only one in Delhi for several decades, today it has approximately 26 establishments in various levels of development and implementation as of end 2025.
Many are already operational, while others are extending their services, thereby offering the best medical facilities to those regions which did not have these services before.
According to the government, "This is because it represents a strategic direction towards a decentralized provision of high quality medical education and less dependence on a few top institutions that monopolize medical education in the country."
It is important to note
MEDICAL COLLEGES MULTIPLY, BUT COMPETITION
Apart from AIIMS, the increase in the number of government medical colleges has been remarkable. Today, the total number of government medical colleges in India stands at over 700, which is approximately twice the number from the previous ten years. The increase in undergraduate and post-graduate seats is also at an all-time high.
However, amidst this numerical expansion of students, competition is as tough as ever. More than 25,000 Indian students move out of the country every year to study for an MBBS degree, which indicates that the gap between availability and demand is yet to be completely filled by expansion.
Despite the increase of around 130% of the number of MBBS seats by the Central Government since 2014, raising the number of available seats to 1,18,137, the number of applicants continues to exceed the available seats vastly. As of the 2025 academic session, only 55,616 seats for MBBS courses exist in government medical colleges, which are further limited due to reservations, according to government regulations.
Consequently, students who qualify for the category of NEET still find it difficult to obtain a seat in the government.
In India, private medical education still largely remains beyond the affordability of the majority of interested students. Regarding this, it can be said that the approximate annual fees required for MBBS in private medical colleges are Rs 7 lakh to Rs 30 lakh or more, apart from the cost of staying in hostels.
As a consequence, this becomes an impossible option for many middle-class families, as well as lower-income families, when it comes to
On the other hand, there exist numerous international medical universities that offer the same MBBS courses for a significantly smaller amount, thus rendering international studies an intelligent and sensible alternative, as opposed to rejecting the Indian system.
FINDING THE GPS COORDINATES
Gaurav Tyagi, Medical Counsellor - Career Xpert, feels that the debate on India's healthcare infrastructure and capacity can often be supplanted by outdated notions and facts.
“In the last 10 years, we now have 23 AIIMS hospitals in the country, and in 2014, there was only one AIIMS hospital,” added Tyagi.
Infrastructural development, according to him, is not only restricted to classrooms and hospitals. The launch of the Ayushman Bharat-PMJAY Scheme, world’s largest public health insurance program, has revolutionized health care coverage.
"Almost 500 million people in the country have access to free health services worth up to Rs 5 lakh every year under Ayushman Bharat-PMJAY. This clearly indicates that the country’s healthcare infrastructure is growing in size and scope as well as their services, too," he said.
This huge volume of patient accessibility, according to Tyagi, makes India the world’s largest training ground in a clinical sense, which provides exposure that many other institutions overseas cannot provide.
REFRAMING THE DISCUSSION ABOUT OVERSE
Tyagi argues that one should not consider foreign education as an option in case of any deficiency in one’s own education system.
“The fact that we don't have access to healthcare facilities is an outdated reason to go abroad. Our choices should be based on objectives, research, and specialist training, and not because we don't have infrastructure in India,” he said.
However, he says that "the challenge facing India is not so much the creation of institutions but rather how to enhance niche subspecialties and research environments that are already strong on a global scale."
WHY STUDENTS STILL LOOK ABROAD
Despite the growing number of medical education institutions and infrastructure in India, several structural and aspirational factors keep pushing aspirants abroad. The postgraduate medical facilities available fall woefully short of the aspiration levels of candidates.
A high tuition fee structure within private medical colleges deprives students of quality learning. Inconsistent standards of teaching staff within medical institutions also influence training.
Here, the desire for global coverage, research, and specialized interests, as well as the impression, possibly well-founded, of easier global mobility when holding an overseas medical degree, must be added.
Professional Goals of Malaysian Doctors
There are, however, certain objectives that Malaysian doctors may want
For several students, pursuing medical education abroad will thus neither be an aversion to the medical system in India nor the opposite; rather, it will be an informed career decision.
During this discussion, the National Medical Commission (NMC) has proposed that foreign medical universities and/or accreditation bodies have to bear an application fee of $10,000 (approximately Rs 8.6 lakh).
One side argues this will help promote quality control and prevent the influx of substandard institutions into the system. On the other hand, some people feel this might limit the choices faced by students in the already complicated international educational system.
INFRASTRUCTURE vs EXPERIENCE: THE REAL GAP
Despite the rapid expansion, the following are still evident: gaps, inequality in distribution of the number of colleges, lack of a culture of research at the newer schools, the fact that the faculties are overwhelmed with patients, and the lack of specialized health care practitioners, especially in the countryside. These factors only enhance the impression that in foreign institutions, one gets more structured training, while in India, one gets incomparable clinical exposure.
The medical education scenario in India has changed remarkably in the last ten years. Today, infrastructure development and increased accessibility and training capacity have been achieved by India to an extent that only a few countries can match. However, the call to study abroad is, and always was, an intensely personal one based on aspiration, affordability, and future projection. The wisdom of the day is to consciously shift the paradigm of discussion: studying abroad should be an option of specialist exposure and not necessarily an imperative of self-perceived deficiencies. As highlighted by experts, it is important to appreciate the extent of public investment and progress that has been achieved in India's health ecosystem before arriving at such a decision. The future challenge is not just an increase in the number of institutions, but it is the issue of quality, equity, and competitiveness so as to make the medical education in India not only adequate but the preferred choice.
