Rs 5,535 cr more for AIIMS-like institutes, medical colleges

In order to meet revised cost of construction, the Government today allocated an additional Rs 5,535 crore for six upcoming AIIMS-like institutes and upgradation of 13 existing government medical colleges.

The additional fund was approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni told reporters.

The CCEA had earlier approved Rs 3,975 crore for the scheme and with the additional funds, the total outlay now stands at Rs 9,307 crore.

The new institutions or upgraded facilities in the existing medical colleges would provide tertiary health care facilities under the 'Pradhan Mantri Gram Swashthya Suraksha Yojana'.

The projects are spread over 19 locations in the 16 states.

The new AIIMS-like institutes will be completed by the end of 2012 at Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Jodhpur, Patna, Raipur and Rishikesh.

The upgradation components in Phase-I includes government medical colleges at Trivandrum, Salem, Bangalore, Kolkata, Jammu and Srinagar, NIMS Hyderabad and B J Medical College, Ahmedabad.

The PMSSY was initially started in March, 2006, with the object of correcting regional imbalances in availability of affordable or reliable tertiary health care services and also to augment facilities for quality medical education in the country.

The PMSSY has two components in its first phase - setting up six AIIMS-like institutions and upgradation of 13 existing government medical college institutions.