SHILLONG: After years of delay and several rounds of paper work, the state government is now planning to retain the tuberculosis hospital in Jhalupara and identify a new location for the proposed medical college in the city.
Sources who are in the knowhow of the project said on Sunday the government is exploring all options before taking a call on whether the medical college and hospital should come up at the site where Reid Provincial Chest Hospital is located.
“The government may also use a portion of the new TB Hospital at Umsawli for the medical college by acquiring more land,” the sources said.
The building at Umsawli has structural anomalies making it unfit for a facility treating tuberculosis patients.
When asked why the government wanted to abandon the earlier plan after so many years, the sources said one of the reasons is that the government has received many representations from patients and senior citizens who feel the existing hospital is a perfect location for TB patients and Umsawli will be too far for them.
Last year, former chief minister Mukul Sangma laid the foundation stone for Shillong Medical College and Hospital at Reid Provincial, five years after an MoU was signed in this regard.
The medical college was supposed to be built on public-private partnership with KPC Medical College in Kolkata.
The initial project cost was Rs 250 crore, which will now be escalated to around Rs 350-400 crore due to the delay.
To a query, the sources said the Tura medical college project is expected to start shortly and “some formalities are taking place”.
“Forest clearance is required before the physical construction of the Tura medical college,” they informed.
The RS 180-crore project in Tura will be constructed on 100 acres at Doldegre, 8 km from the West Garo Hills headquarters.
The college will have 100 seats. The project will also include upgradation of Tura Civil Hospital which, according to the former chief minister, “will act as a teaching hospital”.
