Editor,
Apropos the letter “Unfair Remarks” by Dr R Momin (ST June 28) clarifying her position to a letter written by one J S Marak about health services in shambles in Garo Hills and putting across her stand on the allegations. I beg to differ with the good doctor who was appointed only a couple of months ago to the Mother and Child Hospital at Tura. Her claims that the operating theatre at the MCH was non-functional till May and gynaecologists are overstretched are simply unfounded. I have visited the private Tura Christian Hospital on several occasions to see ailing relatives and each time I have noticed the presence of the good doctor during office hours catering to the needs of the patients when she ought to have been at the government hospital attending to the poor patients who come from remote regions of Garo Hills. There is no truth in her claims of doing justice to the government hospital. One can check the attendance register and interview the hospital staff to get to the truth. Better still, get in touch with those patients who were discharged after medical care from the MCH. They will give the true picture as to who attended on them. Simple as that! It is understandable that the said doctor has stronger leanings towards the private hospital since both her parents served that institution for several decades but what about the government funds amounting to several lakhs that provided her with the medical seat and training? Is it not a waste of government funding? There was a proposal to appoint her at Ampati hospital sometime ago but it was fought tooth and nail by the medical fraternity on the grounds there was an urgent need to have specialists at the MCH hospital. All that has now come to waste! Would she have been able to wilfully break the system in the constituency of the state’s Chief Minister? I doubt that!
The former head of MCH and a senior Gynaecologist under whose direction she operates is also attending to patients at the private hospital. There is no harm in helping patients from different institutions but when one is given a responsibility it ought to be implemented in full. The retired gynaecologist doctor was reappointed on contract basis under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM). The NRHM is paying nothing short of Rs. 60,000 as salary for her services. Where is that money going? Shouldn’t there be accountability? Why does it happen only in Garo Hills? If the two mentioned doctors were to be posted in Khasi Hills would they have dared to break the medical law?
We blame others, including the government, for the poor medical facilities in our region when we only need to look at ourselves. It is our very own people who are the root cause for our dismal state of health.
Yours etc.,
AM Sangma
Tura
Litter litter everywhere!
Editor,
Of late it is observed that most shopkeepers having shops along the entire stretch near the Mizo Church at Happy Valley leading up to Assam Rifles bazaar throw their waste into the road and drains resulting in accumulation of rubbish and garbage during the rainy season. A friend from Bangalore who stayed here for a week while taking a walk with me along this road, remarked that if this is the kind of civic sense that is prevalent here in this part of Shillong how can the city be called the ‘Scotland of The East’. Needless to say the shops in this area belong to non-Khasis and mainly to people from other states of the North East. Sometimes I ask myself how people can be so fashionable on Sundays and so different on weekdays. This brings me to the point made by the writer Patricia Mukhim about her locality. That write-up was not communal but justifies what we locals see everyday. If people were to visit parts of Jaiaw and Mawlai and other areas where the residents are largely from one community they will realize the cleanliness that these localities maintain. It is time to wake up and take action before Shillong becomes a garbage mound.
Yours etc.,
Dominic S Wankhar
Shillong-3
Clarification
Editor
With reference to the news item “AIDS awareness poor in Meghalaya”, (ST, July 15), we would like to seek clarification as to the name of the “Official survey” which your Special News Correspondent from New Delhi based his report as to quote that the awareness level in Meghalaya is 62-63%. Further, we would also like to seek clarification on the period/year in which this survey was conducted as no specific period was mentioned in the article.
Yours etc,
Meghalaya AIDS Control Society,
Shillong
Reporter replies: The news item “AIDS Awareness poor in Meghalaya”, , was taken from a report of ” Indicus Analytics” which is India’s leading research organization. The report which quoted NACO was published on July 14.