Bhubaneswar, Dec. 20: An integrated health care system will be implemented in the city under which six hospitals, including one superspeciality, will be built and run in public private partnership (PPP) mode. The six hospitals will have a total of 800 beds.
The state government's empowered committee on infrastructure today cleared the Greenfield Hospital and Health Network Project.
Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation and a Hyderabad-based health care institute will be the collaborators in the public private partnership project.
As part of the Rs 424 crore project, Rs 51 crore will be given to the private promoter as viable gap funding. The remaining burden will be borne by the private promoter. The project will be dovetailed with the National Urban Health Mission programme.
It will be executed on build, own, operate and transfer (BOOT) basis. A 34-year agreement will be executed between the private and public sector partners. The revenue sharing agreement is expected to be signed in January and the project construction is likely to start in July next year, said official sources.
The private promoter will take up construction and provide manpower and other infrastructure support, while the government will provide land for the hospitals.
Of the six proposed hospitals, the main one will be a referral health care facility. It will have 500 beds and all kinds of superspecialist facilities.
Chief secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi, who chaired today's meeting, directed the officials to earmark a certain number of beds for the treatment of the poor free of cost.
It was decided that 359 of the total 800 beds would be reserved for the poor patients who are covered under Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana, Biju Krushak Kalyan Yojana, Odisha State Treatment Fund and Chief Minister's Relief Fund, said the principal secretary in charge of the public private partnership cell, P.K. Jena.
The main hospital will be set up at Gadakana while the five smaller ones will be located at Kapilaprasad, Brahmeswarpatna, Rasulgarh, Bharatpur and Gadakana.
The empowered committee on infrastructure also gave its nod to three other proposals - construction 1,300 affordable houses for the economically weaker sections in Bhubaneswar, introduction of city bus service at Balasore and establishment of 23 rice storage godowns across the state.
Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation commissioner Krishan Kumar said the 1,300 affordable houses would be allotted to families living in Shanti Nagar and nearby slums.
Ten acres have been earmarked for construction of the housing project at an estimated cost of Rs 92 crore. While the dwelling houses will be built on 6.5 acres, commercial units would be constructed on the remaining 3.5 acres.
The city bus service in Balasore will also be run on the public private partnership mode.
Two private promoters have been selected through a bidding process to run buses on the Balasore-Remuna-Matripur and Balasore-Soro-Nilgiri routes.
Bus fare hike
The state government on Tuesday increased fares for all categories of passenger buses in accordance with the automatic fare adjustment mechanism.
A notification issued by the state commerce and transport department had said the fares for ordinary and express buses would be hiked by 1 paisa per kilometre, while fares for deluxe and AC deluxe category buses would be hiked by 2 paise per kilometre.
