The National Medical Commission’s plan to create a National Medical Register (NMR), is running into rough weather again as doctors are questioning why medical practitioners are being made to pay a fee and register again for entry into the NMR when their database is already available with respective State Medical Councils.
The NMR is envisaged as a single, reliable national database that would make it easier to verify doctors’ qualifications and registration status and facilitate their practice across State boundaries. The system envisages a unique NMR identification number linked to every doctor’s State registration number. Babu.
The question assumes significance as the Ethics and Medical Registration Board (EMRB) of the National Medical Commission (NMC) is moving to amend the Registration of Medical Practitioners and Licence to Practice Medicine Regulations, 2026. Also, in a written reply in the Lok Sabha on August 5, 2025, the Union Health Ministry, quoting the NMC, had said that applying for NMR registration was voluntary.
“Nowhere in the NMC Act is it stated that it is the responsibility of registered medical practitioners to apply for NMR registration,” points out the Kannur-based doctor and RTI activist, K.V.
The concern raised by doctors is genuine. Fewer than 32,000 registered medical practitioners had applied for NMR registration by December 2025, according to the minutes of the NMC’s 17th meeting.
Applications submitted by several doctors for NMR registration have remained pending before the EMRB for years, raising questions about the practicality of requiring every State-registered doctor to individually apply for national registration.
