Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Mar 28: Speaker of Legislative Assembly, Mohd Akbar Lone, today directed the Minister for Health, Sham Lal Sharma, to implement the decisions taken by then Chief Minister, Ghulam Nabi Azad, regarding the opening of the health centers in the erstwhile Doda district.
The directions from the chair came after the former Ministers and MLAs from Inderwal and Doda, G M Saroori and Abdul Majid Wani rued that despite lapse of several years, the decisions taken in the District Development Board-cum-Cabinet meeting chaired by then Chief Minister, Ghulam Nab Azad, regarding the opening of 10 sub-centres and one Primary Health Centre in each constituency of erstwhile Doda district have not been implemented so far.
Then Chief Minister and presently Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Ghulam Nabi Azad, took this decision keeping in view the difficulties being faced by the people of erstwhile Doda district in getting the health care facilities, they said, adding despite repeated assurances on the floor of the House regarding implementation of decisions, nothing has been done so far to open sub-centres and PHCs.
“For opening of health centers in other areas, there is no financial implication but as far as implementing the decisions of Ghulam Nabi Azad is concerned the Government is dragging its feet”, Saroori said, adding “when I raised this issue in the previous sessions and submitted the copy of the minutes of the DDB-cum-Cabinet meeting in which the decisions were taken, the chair had directed the Health Minister for necessary action but it is unfortunate that no step has so far been initiated to open PHCs and sub-centres in each constituency of erstwhile Doda district”.
The former Minister further said, “it doesn’t look nice that despite being in the Government and having Health Minister from Congress, we have to wait for years together to get our genuine concerns addressed”. He sought to know when the decisions taken in DDB-cum-Cabinet meeting of 2008-09 would be implemented.
Taking note of the concerns of Congress MLAs, Speaker directed the Health Minister, Sham Lal Sharma, to give specific reply to the explicit question of the Congress MLAs.
“I am committed to consolidation as well as expansion and Directorate of Remote Sensing has undertaken a mapping survey of erstwhile Doda district to identify the places where there is a need to set up health institutions keeping in view the norms for setting up of such institutions”, the Minister said, adding “as far as the opening of 10 sub-centres in each constituency of erstwhile Doda district, a proposal has been submitted to the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for approval”.
As the Congress MLAs again stood up to get specific reply, Speaker intervened and directed the Health Minister to implement the decisions taken by then Chief Minister, Ghulam Nabi Azad.
Later in the evening, Mr Saroori told EXCELSIOR that all the MLAs from erstwhile Doda district have submitted a memorandum to Speaker as well as Health Minister with the request to translate the decisions taken by Ghulam Nabi Azad into reality.
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