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Sir, I refer to the letter published in June1 and the proceedings of the lower house of Indian Parliament on 19 July 2016 regarding the issue of unemployment among Indian dental graduates.

On 19 July 2016 Dr Retna De Nag, a member of the Indian Parliament (MP), a doctor by profession, raised the issue of acute unemployment among new Indian dentists in a speech in the lower house.2 She spoke of the 309 dental colleges in India that produce about 36,000 dental graduates every year compared to 8,000 in 1970, pointing out that the real issue is due to this mushrooming of dental colleges about which the Dental Council of India (DCI) had done nothing. She accused the DCI of failing miserably in performing its primary function and said that the regulator should have acted in time to adjust the availability of dentists dependent on demand.

Now that the issue has reached parliament, the dental organisations and the professional community in India should use this as an opportunity and should mobilise all their resources to address it. The community should press for the creation of more job opportunities in the government sector, especially in rural areas, which can be done easily by starting dental units in the existing primary health centres. The Indian dentist community should also raise their voice for a moratorium against further opening of dental schools and places for undergraduate dental education.