The Microbiology EQAS under the umbrella of Indian Association of Medical Microbiologists (IAMM) was started in the year 1993 by the Department of Microbiology, Christian Medical College, Vellore under the leadership of the Head of the Department, Prof. T. Jacob John and Prof. Mary V Jesudason. Prof. Mary V Jesudason continued to be part of it from Amala Institute of Medical Sciences, Thrissur and Sankara Nethralaya, Chennai until 2016. Initially, the program was catering to the laboratories across the country. However, as the number of laboratories increased, it has been divided into two regional providers, one for the south and one for the North conducted by Sri Ganga Ram Hospital under the leadership of Prof. Chand Wattal. In the year 2017, the IAMM decided to transfer the PT provider for the southern region to Christian Medical College, Vellore. We have decided to run the PT program one for Bacteriology from the Department of Clinical Microbiology and second for Virology from the Department of Clinical Virology.