Postgraduate courses in 14 new streams of medical science will commence shortly at the Malda Medical College and Hospital, authorities said here on Friday.

According to them, the Medical Council of India and the state health department have already granted the necessary permission to the medical colleges to start the PG courses.

“With the introduction of the new courses, the number of streams available for PG courses will increase to 17,” said Puranjay Saha, the vice-principal of the medical college.

As of now, PG courses in paediatrics, gynaecology and microbiology are taught in the college. Altogether, there are 11 seats for these three streams in the college.

“We have received approval for 82 more seats for 14 different PG courses. The idea is to introduce these courses from the next academic session,” Saha said.

The new streams include community medicine, general medicine, forensic medicine and toxicology, general surgery, biochemistry, and orthopaedics.

He said the state health department had instructed the medical college authorities to take all necessary steps to start the courses.

“Construction of a new hostel building is in progress and the agency will shortly hand it over to us. We also have an adequate number of teachers who would take classes for these courses,” he added.

Sources said the medical college would spend around Rs 90 crore to ready the infrastructure required for the new PG courses.

“In some streams, there will be four seats while some will have five seats,” said a faculty member of the medical college.

The Malda district hospital was upgraded into a medical college in 2011. It is the second-largest state-run health infrastructure in north Bengal after the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital.