Biometric attendance for junior doctors is set to be introduced at two major government medical colleges in Kolkata after allegations that internship and other duty shifts were being exchanged or performed through proxies. The face-based system will initially cover interns, house staff and postgraduate trainees at SSKM Hospital and NRS Medical College, according to a report by Sangbad Pratidin – Kolkata.
Under the proposed arrangement, junior doctors will have to record their attendance through facial biometric devices before starting duty and again when leaving after the scheduled shift. The attendance records will be monitored regularly by the in-charge officials of the respective departments.
The health department is also expected to issue a notification for registering all interns, house staff and postgraduate trainees in the biometric system. Identity cards will be issued to the doctors covered by the process, according to the report. Doctors seeking leave will have to inform the head of their department in advance.
The immediate decision follows allegations of a system in which junior doctors allegedly sold or exchanged duty assignments for money. The report said complaints had reached state Health Minister Dr Sharadwat Bandyopadhyay, with claims that a duty-selling network operated across several government medical colleges. It also referred to alleged WhatsApp groups used by interns to arrange duty swaps and create rate charts.
The reported rates allegedly ranged from Rs 200 to Rs 250 per hour, depending on the medical college and duty arrangement. These claims have not been independently established in the supplied report. The report attributed the allegation to complaints received by the health minister and said the practice had allegedly continued for about three years across different medical colleges.
The proposed biometric system is intended to prevent proxy attendance and ensure that doctors follow the prescribed duty roster. The health department will also increase monitoring of whether junior doctors remain present and perform their assigned duties during working hours, the report said.
The first phase is limited to SSKM and NRS Medical College. The health department plans to extend the system to other government medical colleges in stages, although the supplied report does not specify a rollout schedule, the number of biometric devices to be installed or the detailed procedure for handling attendance disputes and data access.
The move places attendance control within a wider administrative challenge facing public hospitals: ensuring that staffing records accurately reflect who is available on the floor during a scheduled shift. For patients, the immediate operational relevance is whether the system improves accountability at the point where staffing, duty rosters and hospital service delivery meet. The next formal step is the health department’s notification covering registration, identity cards and implementation of the biometric process.
