Protests force Vedanta to postpone hospital plan

The 500-bed multi-speciality hospital of the Vedanta University Project (VUP), promoted by the Anil Agarwal Foundation (AAF), at Puri in Orissa, is set to be operational in 2011.

The hospital, along with the first phase of the academic programme of the Vedanta University, was earlier targeted to be operational in 2010. But with the local protests slowing down the work on the project, the deadline has been shifted by a year.

The hospital, a non-profit institution, would come up on an area of 37 acres, close to the Puri-Konark Marine drive at an investment of about Rs 400 crore. Construction work on the hospital is expected to be taken up soon after the Rehabilitation and Resettlement (R&R) colony is built by the company.

The construction work on the R&R colony for 105 families to be displaced by the Vedanta University is set to commence after the end of the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in Orissa. The R&R colony is expected to be completed within six months.

Addressing media persons at the launch of the hospital project, CV Krishnan, chief executive officer, VUP, said, “Our multi-speciality hospital would commence its services in 2011. Apart from the hospital, we are also thinking of setting up a medical college, which would offer undergraduate, post-graduate, doctoral and post-doctoral courses and also courses for practicing doctors.

“The multi-speciality hospital would be a part of the VUP, which is being developed over 6,000 acres and we have already acquired about 4,000 acres for the project,” he claimed.

Commenting on the occasion, Sanjeev Anand Zutshi, director, VUP, said, “The 500-bed multi-speciality hospital would commence its operations in 2011 during the first phase of the university project. Orders for construction for the hospital have already been placed with L&T.”

KP Misra, a leading cardiologist and one of the advisors of the hospital project, said, “The hospital would serve as a regional hub for cardiology and diabetology. As a teaching and research hospital, it will attract leading researchers and specialists in medical science all over the world.”

It may be noted that the university project has been facing stiff resistance from the locals on land acquisition issue. The project has been unable to make significant progress on the ground even though AAF signed the MoU (memorandum of understanding) with the Orissa government in July 2006.

VUP, being built at a cost of about Rs 5,000 crore provided by the Anil Agarwal Foundation as grant, is set to have an intake of about 1,00,000 students after it is fully operational. The university would have Centres of Excellence to drive cutting-edge and multi-disciplinary research.