Nearly seven months after a petition was filed at the Charity Commissioner’s office against the B.D. Petit Parsee General Hospital’s (PGH) agreement to make way for a cosmopolitan hospital in its campus, a reply was filed on Monday. The petition was filed by Parsi community member Khushru Zaiwala (75).
The Parsi community has been up in arms against the managing committee of PGH for the decision to make way for a new hospital in the PGH campus to be equipped and run by the Medanta group. The community members feel the agreement was illegal as the committee does not own the property and that the entire deal is undervalued for the community.
“Even in their reply, the committee says they are the owners of the hospital,” said Mr. Zaiwala’s son Rayomand. The committee’s reply was not taken by the commissioner as they wanted to change their lawyer. “They have only served the reply to the petitioner,” he said.
Charity commissioner Shivkumar Dige said an appropriate order will be given after studying the reply as well as the arguments raised in the petition.
The 106-year-old PGH, a community asset that falls under the Bombay Parsi Punchayet, is located in a prime location in Cumballa Hill. Parsis say they have lost many community assets due to bad decision-making and they don’t want to let go of another one in the same manner.
The new hospital was to be built with a donation of $22.5 million from a Hong Kong-based couple. The PGH managing committee hoped to cross-subsidise the existing Parsis-only facility, which is running in annual losses of over ₹8 crore.
However, community members feel the new hospital may not make profits, and South Mumbai has several hospitals that are struggling to survive.
