Land allotted, but still no govt hospital in Dwarka
TOI, 21.4.
NEW DELHI: The 6.7 lakh residents of Dwarka don't have a government hospital decades after they settled in the area. In 1997, a 15-acre plot in Sector 9 was allotted to the public works department (PWD) for a full-fledged hospital.
The proposed hospital was also given a name: Priyadarshini Indira Gandhi Hospital. It was part of a plan to build five peripheral hospitals in Delhi to serve the growing population on the outskirts. After the foundation ceremony in August 2008, no stone has been turned on the site. The deadline for the project is 2016, revealed an RTI filed by Arun Banerjee, a Dwarka resident.
As part of the plan to equip the capital's periphery with first-rate healthcare, Delhi Health Services (DHS) wrote to DDA in the early 1990s and sought land to build a hospital. After the transfer of land from DDA to PWD, no agency has undertaken work on the site. Meanwhile, departments, including Delhi Fire Service, PWD and DDA, as well as DHS members have held several meetings. The scope of the project, along with the budget, has only grown on paper.
From an initial estimate of Rs 125 crore for a 500-bed hospital, the project expanded to a Rs 350 crore facility with 700 beds. With the revision of floor-area ratio (FAR) norms and introduction of Master Plan Delhi 2021, officials settled on a Rs 566.5-crore project.
"The construction was delayed because of the involvement of multiple agencies," said the Comptroller Auditor General, which elaborated, in its last report, on the state of hospitals that were announced by the Delhi government but never materialized.
Dismissing the government's reply that the "appreciation of cost of land was actually a gainful investment in capital assets", CAG wrote the reply was not acceptable as the prime objective of the government was to provide health services and not get involved in capital investment.
A DDA official, meanwhile, said the authority had done its duty by allotting land to PWD. "We didn't give the land ourselves. DDA, at least, has followed all the regulations and handed over the land to PWD at behest of the Delhi government."
A senior PWD engineer said the Delhi government was undecided and hadn't commissioned the project as it was exploring the PPP model. "The government was considering private investment in the project. But after a hospital set up through public-private partnership in Shahdara did not work, it had second thoughts." According to the official, the PPP model was junked by the government about one and a half years ago, and it was only a couple of days before the poll code came into place that the last Delhi government sanctioned the project.
Now, PWD is waiting for the elections to be over so that a contractor could be hired for the project. According to some reports, the 15-acre plot has about 100 trees, which would mean another round of permissions and environment assessment plans have to be cleared through Delhi's environment ministry.
In the meantime, residents of Dwarka will have only a few government-funded dispensaries and private establishments to fulfil their needs.