Dr Govinda KC on Sunday issued a 10-day ultimatum to the government to revoke its decision to grant affiliation to Kathmandu National Medical College. He has warned of starting another round of hunger strike from September 6 if government continue to turn a deaf ear to his demands.

In a statement on Sunday, Dr KC said that the Prime Minister (PM), in his capacity as Chancellor of Tribhuvan University, should also take responsibility for the affiliation. He has also expressed suspicion of wrongdoing by PM and Education Minister because of their silence despite criticism from several quarters for the controversial affiliation.

Apart from the annulment of affiliation, Dr KC has also demanded that the jurisdiction for granting affiliation, enrolling students, and determine fee structure should be granted to the Institute of Medicine.

He has also reiterated his earlier demands that Health Profession Education Bill should be immediately endorsed incorporating the recommendations made by a team of experts under Dr Kedar Bhakta Mathema.

Similarly, Dr KC has said that the office bearers of TU including Vice-Chancellor, Rector and Registrar should be immediately sacked for their decision to grant affiliation despite his repeated hunger strikes against it.

The TU Executive Council on July 27 granted affiliation to the medical school grounding its decision on a Supreme Court verdict. The country’s oldest varsity has claimed that the affiliation was given to the medical college to run the MBBS course as per the order of SC’s division bench of then-Chief Justice Damodar Prasad Sharma and Justice Om Prakash Mishra on September 16, 2014.

 In the final hearing, the SC had argued that there was no reason to deny affiliation if the medical college meets the set criteria. However, another SC decision on March 2, 2017 had stated that barring the affiliation was not a case of contempt of court, as claimed by the petitioner, since the government was working seriously in ending anomalies in the medical education sector.

This college is an extension of the Birgunj-based National Medical College, owned by Basruddin Ansari, who is tipped to be the CPN-UML mayoral candidate for the Birgunj Metropolitan City.