NGO urges govt to facilitate site for serai at hospital

Dinesh Kanwar

Hamirpur, December 02

A voluntary organisation, Senior Citizen Council, has urged the authorities to provide a site for the construction of a “serai” at the Zonal Hospital (ZH) complex in Hamirpur.

Sources said the Senior Citizen Council had offered to construct a serai in the hospital complex at a cost of Rs 2 crore, provided a piece of land was made available to them. As per the project report, the NGO had offered to construct the serai by renovating or dismantling an old structure in the hospital complex which had been abandoned due to its poor condition. Earlier, this building housed the X-ray department of the hospital.

A few years ago, the council had constructed a building on the hospital premises at a cost of Rs 45 lakh. This building is being used to house a kitchen, banquet hall, NGO office and a conference hall. The NGO is being run by retired officers with funds collected from public donations.

The NGO has been working for the last 15 years in the hospital. It has been providing free food to indoor patients and their attendants.

Gian Chand Sharma, president of the council, said they had requested the government and the Health Department to give them the land but a positive response was awaited. He said the NGO wanted to construct the serai to provide accommodation to attendants of the patients. He said the location of the old X-ray building was most suitable for it. He said the NGO was not seeking the transfer of land in its name and as such the land as well as the serai would remain in the name of the Health Department.

Dr PR Katwal, Chief Medical Officer, said the Health Department was ready to provide the land to the NGO near the doctors’ residences that were well within the hospital complex and the site was also near patients’ wards. He said the location that the NGO was demanding had been identified for the construction of a trauma care centre, so it could not be given to the council.