Patients hopeful about getting quality care at the outpatient department of Patna AIIMS could be in for a disappointment on Independence Day.

The deadline for opening the department is August 15 but not only is the construction of the building incomplete but also essential equipment, like X-ray, ultrasound, CT scan and MRI machines, are yet to be purchased.

The director of the institute, G.K. Singh, admitted to The Telegraph on Thursday that the outpatient department of the hospital would be fully functional only in October.

“What can we do? We are helpless. The construction company was supposed to hand over two floors of the outpatient department to us in August. It had also promised to provide us with the building of the physical medicine and rehabilitation department, Ayush department and trauma and emergency department in August. But so far, only the physical medicine and rehabilitation department building is complete,” he said.

Singh also said: “We are constantly being told to start a full-fledged outpatient department in August but our problems are hardly taken into consideration. How can we run a full-fledged department without any space? The company told us that the construction of the department would be complete only in end-October. Only after that can we start a full-fledged outpatient department.”

Patna High Court had started monitoring the construction work of the hospital and had set October 2, 2012, as the deadline for the facility to start functioning.

Brajesh Kumar, a member of the three-member committee formed by the high court to monitor the construction work of Patna AIIMS, said: “When we visited the hospital last month, the project director, Ratnesh Kumar, had said the civil work for the outpatient department would be completed by August 15. But now, you are telling me that it has not been done. This is sheer negligence on the part of the Centre and the contractor.”

Another official in charge of construction said one floor was ready and another would be completed in three days but director Singh said nothing was complete.

New Delhi-based construction BL Kashyap is executing the project to build the hospital. None of the senior officials of the company was available to comment.

A source at the hospital said not only the outpatient department but also the construction work at different laboratories is also incomplete.

The second-year MBBS student would need to use pathology, microbiology and pharmacology laboratories for their practical classes from September. The space has been demarcated for the laboratories and pipelines have been laid but the customised desks, which the students need to conduct their experiments, are not yet complete. The source said it would take at least two months to complete the construction work.

The MBBS course has 30 per cent practical in the second year. If the laboratories are not ready in time, the students would be burdened with more work at the year-end.

A student of the first batch of MBBS students, who are now in the second year, said the authorities concerned should ensure that the construction of the laboratories was completed in time so that they did not face any problem in finishing their syllabus.