In the rough and tumble of electoral politics, a proposed government medical college being constructed on a donated plot here has become a core issue.
The much-needed facility, which is yet to meet Medical Council of India (MCI) norms, has rival parties claiming credit for its establishment.
The voters in Rajasthan’s arid, northern Shekhawati region are upset over the delay in starting the medical college. The college is still being constructed, though it was announced along with six other colleges during the previous Congress regime. After the change of government in 2013, the project went to the neighbouring Churu district, with Sikar being included later in a Centrally sponsored scheme.
The Kalyan Arogya Sadan Trust donated 80-bigha land adjacent to its charitable tuberculosis hospital in the city for the medical college in 2016, but the proposal to attach the existing Shri Kalyan Government Hospital to it has not succeeded as the latter lacks facilities specified by the MCI norms.
The college principal and controller, Govardhan Meena, told The Hindu that since the MCI inspection teams had repeatedly rejected the government hospital’s status as an attached institution, it was proposed to build a new 300-bed hospital on an adjacent piece of land, also to be made available by the trust.
The medical college project was brought to Sikar, considered the headquarters of the Shekhawati region, following sustained agitation by local activists and students' bodies, including the Students' Federation of India.
Patients from the area in need of specialised treatment were referred to Jaipur, adding to the burden on the Sawai Man Singh Government Hospital given the ill-equipped government health institutions.
Sagar Khachariawas, district president of the All India Kisan Sabha, affiliated to the CPI(M), said the ruling BJP and the Congress had exploited the medical college issue to get votes without taking any concrete steps to ensure that the institution started functioning.
“The original plan was shifted to a smaller town, Churu, only because it is the constituency of erstwhile Health Minister Rajendra Rathore,” he said.
While Dr. Meena affirmed that the construction would be completed in the next two months and the college’s first academic session would start in July 2019, social activist Ashfaq Kayamkhani said the BJP and Congress candidates should spell out their plans to get the college started.
“In the race to get creditfor bringing the institution to the city, the attention shifted from construction of building and its monitoring. This has led to a slower work here unlike other cities where medical colleges have come up,” Mr. Kayamkhani said. For the voters of Sekhawati, it has been a long wait for healthcare which still entails a long journey to State capital Jaipur.
The MCI inspection team had reported that the departments of anatomy, physiology and biochemistry were not functioning in the hospital proposed to be attached to the medical college, while the facilities such as lecture theatre, central library, central photography section, students' hostels and residential quarters were not found available.
₹32 crore have been sanctioned in the first phase for renovating an existing building on the land measuring 2,903 square metres, while a new building is being constructed on the land of the size of 3,164 square metres. The construction work has been taken up by the State government's body, the Rajasthan State Road Development & Construction Corporation.
The Medical Education Department has conducted interviews for selecting 104 faculty members and sought options from the hospital staff for switching over to the department while being in service. Additionally, the demand for an outlay for paying salary to the staff members has been raised with the State government's Finance Department.
