Shashi Tharoor, MP, has demanded that the State government and State unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) move the Centre to sanction the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) it had promised for Kerala.
“Though the Union government had promised AIIMS for all the States, it is yet to formally sanction the proposal for Kerala. Responses to my questions at the Parliament suggest that the Union Cabinet is yet to allot AIIMS for the State,” Mr. Tharoor said while addressing a meeting of trade and professional bodies convened by the Trivandrum Chamber of Commerce and Industry (TCCI) here on Thursday.
“Thiruvananthapuram is best suited for AIIMS given the excellent R&D ecosystem here. However, the State government has suggested only one location - Kinalur at Kozhikode, as against the four choices, including Thiruvananthapuram, given by the earlier UDF government. The State must leave it to the Centre to decide on the site on merit,” he added.
S.N. Raghuchandran Nair, president, TCCI; K. Srikant, secretary, Trivandrum Agenda Task Force (TATF); and Renjith Ramanujam, Chief Executive Officer, Awake Trivandrum; led the discussions. Representatives of the Indian Medical Association (IMA), Indian Dental Association (IDA), GTech, CREDAI, Builders Association of India (BAI) and Trivandrum Bar Association were present at the meeting.
