Today, October 29, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) caught two officials of the government medical college in Bhadradri Kothagudem District of Telangana for allegedly taking a bribe of Rs 3 lakh. The Administrative Officer (AO) and Junion Assistant were caught by the ACB when they demanded an amount of Rs 7 lakh and "accepted bribe" amount of Rs 3 lakh as initial payment from a complainant for showing official favour, an ACB release said, PTI reported.

The official favour was to prepare the salary bills for outsourcing employees and to reinstate 23 outsourcing employees supplied by the complainant, who was removed from the college, it added. Thus, the accused officers performed their duty "improperly and dishonestly to obtain undue advantage", the ACB said.

Further, it said that the bribe amount was recovered from the office table of the AO and the case is under investigation, the release added.

New medical colleges

On September 10, Minister for Health C Damodar Raja Narasimha announced that the state Telangana has increased its number of government medical colleges to 34, following the approval of eight new medical colleges by the National Medical Commission (NMC) for the current academic year, as reported by The Hindu.

The newly approved medical colleges will be established in Mulugu, Narsampet, Jogulamba Gadwal, Narayanpet, Yadadri Bhongir, Medak, Maheshwaram, and Qutbullapur. Each college will offer 50 MBBS seats, adding a total of 400 seats to the state’s capacity. With this addition, the total number of MBBS seats in government medical colleges across Telangana will rise to 4,090.