The Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijayabaskar on Tuesday made another appeal to the centre to quicken the process to build an All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) hospital in the state.
The health minister approached union minister JP Nadda with a request to build three ‘multi-super specialty’ hospitals in Thanjavur, Madurai and Tirunelveli. Further, he requested Nadda to inaugurate the vaccine centre which has been built in Chengalpet with a budget of 600 crore rupees.
He further asked for a medical college to be set up in Ramanathapuram and a dental college in Virudhunagar.
The idea to bring in an AIIMS facility into the state was initially proposed by former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, J Jayalalithaa. During her tenure, the project was approved and a 5 member team had been established to determine the appropriate venue for the same.
While Madurai, Erode and Pudukottai were among the regions which were narrowed in on, Thoppur was ultimately selected for a number of reasons including its connectivity to the highway.
Chief Minister Edappadi Palaniswami had earlier announced that the hospital would be built over 200 acres of land and would have 100 MBBS seats and 60 nursing ones. The project is estimated to cost around 1,500 crore rupees in total. An estimate of 750 beds are planned to be set up at the hospital.
It is interesting to note that the state of Andhra Pradesh only recent open doors to its new AIIMS institution in Mangalagiri, though classes are presently being held at Siddhartha Medical College (SMC). The out patient department and residential area is slated to be complete by 2019 after which the students and staff will proceed with classes at the campus.
An RTI filed earlier this year revealed that funds had not yet been allocated for the AIIMS project, which was resulting in delays in launching the same in the state.