5 girls do Mumbai college proud, top the final BUMS exams

MUMBAI: Siddiqui Namira Kulsum from Kurla is ecstatic. She has broken a jinx in her family. Girls were not encouraged to study beyond 10th standard and, but by clearing Bachelor in Unani Medicine and Surgery (BUMS), she has become the first female graduate in her family.
But Kulsum is happy not only for that. Her achievement is being celebrated also because she is among the five top ranking girl students from her college—Anjuman-I-Islam’s Dr M I J Tibbia Unani Medical College & H A R Kalsekar Tibbia Hospital in Versova, Andheri--in the BUMS final exams (winter 2021).
Though results were delayed due to the pandemic, the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences (MUHS), Nashik holds BUMS exams twice a year, in summer and winter. Significantly, in the summer 2021 exam too, the first five toppers in BUMS at the university were from this Unani Medical College in Versova. With 81.4%, Kulsum shares fifth position with another girl student, Farheen, from Malegaon.
“The credit goes to my grandfather who encouraged me and ensured that I studied beyond matriculation and today I am the first female graduate and a doctor in my family,” says Kulsum as her co-toppers—Ansari Layba Saeeduzzaman (84.33%), Shaikh Zoya Rashid Ahmed (82.60%), Islahi Kulsum Ahmed (82.06%) and Farooqui Tahura Ambreen (81.46%)—look on.
Out of 420 students from seven Unani Medical Colleges affiliated to MUHS, Nashik, the five toppers from Versova College have brought laurels for the College as well as to the 150-year-old Anjuman-I-Islam which runs it. “At the felicitation function of the five toppers of the summer 2021 batch I told the students of the next batch that we wanted this record to be maintained. These girls took it as a challenge and have made us proud by excelling,” says the principal Dr Raashid Qazi. Since admissions to Unani Medical Colleges are done on the basis of marks secured in the NEET exam, Qazi adds, his college is the first preference of candidates applying for admission in BUMS.
In a recent meeting with TOI, Anjuman-I-Islam’s president Dr Zahir Kazi had said:“I am thrilled by the excellent performance of this college and especially by the girl students. The credit goes to the dedication, diligence of the principal and faculty and other staff members who keep the students focused.” There is an intake of 60 students in first year BUMS. Out of this, in the winter 2021 batch only 14 were boys. This only confirms a trend. More girls are joining higher studies and parents increasingly encourage daughters to become doctors.
First ranker Ansari Layba Saeeduzzaman’s father works in a loom in Bhiwandi and she is the first doctor in her family. “I always wanted to become a doctor. Since I couldn’t get into MBBS or BDS, I chose BUMS as here too we are taught about modern medicine apart from the traditional Unani medicine. I want to do PG after finishing a one-year internship (six months at college, three months in a city hospital and three months in a hospital in a rural area),” she says. According to government norms, Unani doctors are also allowed to practise allopathy. Recently Madras High Court ordered that AYUSH (Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy) practitioners are eligible to practice Allopathy along with their respective system of medicine.
Islahi Kulsum Ahmed comes from a family of doctors. Her grandfather Hakim Mukhtar Ahmed Islahi was among the pioneers in popularising the Unani system of treatment in Maharashtra.