Azad holds meetings as PM enquires AIIMS revamping
New Delhi | Thursday, Sep 10 2009 IST
 

Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has been holding hectic parleys to streamline the functioning of his ministry following Prime Minister Manmohan Singh writing him on a delay in revamping AIIMS and functioning of the rural health sector.

''Mr Azad was holding consultations with the senior officials of the ministry and a lot of meetings were being held,'' sources said here today on condition of anonymity.

They said the meetings were also being held as the minister has to present a report card about performance of Health Ministry in the first 100 days on September 19 while he would hold a press conference on the performance of the National Rural Health Mission on September 16. During these events the issue of the Prime Minister's letter to the minister may come up, they added.

The Prime Minister in a strongly worded letter on September 2 had asked Mr Azad to ensure a successful and innovative restructuring of the premier medical institution on a priority basis by expeditiously implementing the report of the Valiathan Committee appointed by him.

The Committee was set up by the Prime Minister to look into the functioning of the AIIMS, and get back to him on the administrative and legislative changes required to reform the institution.

Pointing out that AIIMS was the most prestigious medical institution of the country, the Prime Minister had asked Mr Azad to radically reform of the institution so that it becomes not just a model for the establishment of other similar institutions in the country but also achieves levels of excellence on par with the best medical institutions in the world. The Committee had recommended greater autonomy to the AIIMS to make it ''immune'' to political interference. Dr Singh had urged Mr Azad to take up the matter as a ''priority task of the Ministry of Health'' as the agenda for reform should be far-reaching.

The AIIMS had been much in news during the tenure of former Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss for his tussle with then AIIMS Director P Venugopal. The four-member Valiathan Committee report which was set up at the peak of the anti-reservation agitation in the AIIMS in 2004 had recommended, among other things, more autonomy to the institution. The committee suggested that the selection for the director's post be done by a search-cum-selection committee headed by the president of the institute and the age of retirement be raised from 62 to 65.

-- (UNI) -- 10DI64.xml

 

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