unqualified doctors like these are referred to as “Bengali doctors,” because one of the earliest medical colleges in India was in Bengal and doctors from Bengal fanned across northern India looking for places to practice medicine. That tradition has continued—people continue to show up in a village with little more than a stethoscope and a bag of standard medications and set up as Bengali doctors, irrespective of whether they are from Bengal or not. We interviewed one who explained how he became a doctor: “I graduated from high school and couldn’t find a job, which is when I decided to set up
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