The Lady	The Land
Deepa Das Munshi at the news conference in Raiganj on Monday	The proposed site in Panishala for the AIIMS-like hospital. Pictures by Nantu Dey

Raiganj, April 1: Deepa Das Munshi, the crusader-in-chief for the proposed AIIMS in Raiganj, today flashed a Union health ministry letter seeking land cost estimates from the district authority and spoke of direct land acquisition from “willing” Panishala farmers.

Sources in the Union health ministry in the know, however, were not too optimistic about the prospects of setting up an AIIMS in Raiganj without the state government’s co-operation.

A Union health ministry source even said that Kalyani, the place where chief minister Mamata Banerjee wants the hospital to come up, may be better suited for such a project as it is closer to Calcutta than Deepa’s Lok Sabha constituency.

Today, showing the letter in the Raiganj Congress office at North Dinajpur, Deepa said: “The Union health ministry’s deputy secretary, Oma Nand, wrote to the sabhadhipati on March 6 asking for the land details through the state authorities or the district magistrate. The sabhadhipati has written to the health minister on March 22 stating that the cost of acquiring the 100 acres in Panishala would be Rs 22 crore approximately.”

She said: “With the state government’s unco-operative attitude as far as land acquisition is concerned, we are left with no other option than to acquire the land directly from the farmers. There is no problem in doing so.” Deepa added that “if the state government tries to stall our efforts we will act according to what the situation demands”.

The letter from the ministry does not mention anything about direct land acquisition at Panishala, which is near Raiganj. The missive made it clear that it was written in response to a letter sent by district authorities to Delhi on February 7, 2013. District authorities today said the February letter had sought the Centre’s help in acquisition of land for the AIIMS in Panishala.

But a senior official in the health ministry, who did not wish to be named, said the project could face “misery” daily if it was done without the state’s consent.

The central ministry source said the establishment of an AIIMS in a state needed to be ideally pursued with the co-operation of the state government.

The source also doubted if funds would be made available to buy land for the project, given that the AIIMS hospitals coming up in other states were being done on land given by the governments there.

“The (other) state governments have given us land at all the sites for AIIMS. When we seek the Rs 22 crore, we're likely to be asked: why aren't we getting land from Bengal,” the source told The Telegraph.

“In any case, we need co-operation from the state government, without that we could face misery on a daily basis during the process of building the institution,” the source added.

Some experts in the ministry said Kalyani, which is closer to Calcutta, would be a more appropriate site for the AIIMS than Raiganj. “This is particularly important for drawing faculty and doctors for the institution,” a ministry source said.

Medical colleges and hospital complexes for six new AIIMS are under construction in Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Jodhpur, Raipur and Rishikesh.

The project needs 100 acres and Deepa has claimed that 87 farmers in Panishala have agreed to give their land for the proposed central hospital.

“The willing farmers even joined our campaign on October 12 last year when they wanted to record their decision to sell their land in non-judicial stamp paper to the chief minister. However, they were not allowed to go to Writers’ Buildings by the police as per the chief minister’s order,” Deepa said.

The ministry official said: “Only politics is holding back an AIIMS in Bengal, and patients in Bengal are the sufferers.”

Deepa said: “The land records (of the Panishala plot) and its geographical details are being sent to the Union health ministry as soon as possible.” She said that the Congress would keep its promise to set up the AIIMS here with all sincerity.