Pakistan has also recently vastly increased tuition fees in its well-known government medical college, the Army Medical College (AMC) in Rawalpindi. Through this write-up, I have discussed the fee details of MBBS/BDS applying for Pakistani, dual national and overseas students and presented some light on this massive fee raise.
AMC MBBS Tuition Fee Structure 2024-2029
Pakistani students who wish for an MBBS degree must now pay PKR 1,000,000 per year for tuition fees. In speculative over the five-year program, it will sum up to PKR 5,000,000. This fee structure does not include other charges like hostel fees, admission fees, or other incidental expenses.
Foreign, dual national, and overseas Pakistani students must pay USD 13,200 per year, which amounts to USD 66,000 for the program. These figures show AMC’s creativity in offering quality medical education, which is accompanied by expensive demands from the students.
AMC BDS Tuition fee structure (session 2024-2028)
The annual tuition fee for BDS Pakistani students has been fixed at PKR 1,000,000, and the total cost to be paid by the students at the end of the BDS program is PKR 4,000,000. Like the MBBS program, this fee structure excludes hostel charges, admission fees, and other related expenses.
For foreign, dual nationality, and overseas Pakistani students, the BDS course annual fee is 13200 US dollars, making the total fee of 52800 US dollars for the BDS program. This implies that the customers and the fee structure illustrate the financial implications of acquiring dental education at AMC.
Fee Hike: A Cause for Concern?
Amid fee hikes, the latest one at AMC has attracted the attention of various medical education institutions. Earlier, for session 2022, the annual tuition fee was PKR 220,000 for all programs. But in 2023, it reached PKR 1,000,000, an increase of over 350 % in just one year. This dramatic rise puts AMC’s fee structure on par with Pakistan’s private medical colleges.
Ironically, AMC is a government institute, and such a steep hike makes it very expensive for many young and aspiring medical students, especially from middle-class families. All the same, AMC’s reputation on quality education is not in jeopardy, but one must recognize the pressure that placing such a fee hike bears.
Additional Costs
As mentioned earlier, the tuition fees bear no coverage for other related costs, including hostel fees, admission charges, and other miscellaneous fees. The above expenses pile up the costs of students and families even more, making medical education an even more onerous task for many individuals.
Final Thoughts
Army Medical College Rawalpindi is one of Pakistan’s best and most well-known medical colleges. However, the high inflation in tuition fees has raised awareness of the cost and expenses. As much as the fee increment may be attributed to the operational costs and quality education imparted at the institutions, so much market differentiation between the public and private medical institutions is lessened.
It is within this context that various financial factors, crucial for would-be learners and their families when designing their learning careers at AMC, are discussed.
