Speed up infrastructure work, Principal Secy Tiwari tells officials

Tribune News Service

Patiala, January 23

To expedite the ongoing infrastructural works at Government Rajindra Hospital and Medical College, DK Tiwari, Principal Secretary, Medical Education, today ordered the officials concerned to complete the projects.

Tiwari, along with top officials of the Medical Education Department, held a meeting with different stakeholders here at Government Medical College (GMC) today. The meeting was also attended by Harjinder Singh, Principal, Medical College; Avnish Kumar, Director, Research and Medical Education (DRME) and Dr KK Talwar, Medical Education Adviser, Punjab Government.

In the meeting, the secretary asked the officials concerned to specify the reasons for the untimely delay in the completion of different projects even after missing several deadlines. It had been learned that various stakeholder agencies were facing a shortage of funds to complete the projects.

Major development projects, including Rs 150 crore super-specialty block and Mother and Child Health Care (MCH) Centre, at Government Rajindra Hospital are said to have been facing several infrastructural deficiencies.

In fact, the MCH building, completed in 2017, was nonfunctional until now. Besides, the institute building at the GMC, worth Rs 35 crore, had been lying locked for over a year now.

According to sources, Tiwari had assured the officials that funds would be released, immediately. One of the major reasons for the delay in the completion of various projects was of uncleared bills of the contractors.

Consequently, a special meeting in this regard had already been called on Saturday.

DK Tiwari said, “I held a meeting with all stakeholders to clear the bottlenecks in the ongoing infrastructural works at the college and hospital. Various issues, raised by the offcials concerned, will be addressed and projects will be completed soon.

Meanwhile, Harjinder Singh, Principal, said, “We are trying our best so as to run these world-class facilities at the hospital. We are continuously holding meetings with the stakeholders to complete the major projects at the earliest.”

Fails to visit project sites

Surprisingly, DK Tiwari and other officials completed their visit without physically visiting the project sites. Though visit to the project sites was in the schedule Tiwari left for Chandigarh citing a meeting with the higher officials. Tiwari said he had been called for a meeting, therefore, he had to cut short his visit.

No action on private practice by doctors

On the issue of action against the doctors indulging in private practices, he said, “I will take action only after I receive a written complaint along with video proof of a doctor indulged in private practice.” The Tribune had recently highlighted that several doctors at Government Rajindra Hospital were running private clinics.