The state health department has accused Bengal’s only private medical college of breach of contract.
KPC Medical College in Jadavpur, unveiled in 2008, has allegedly backed out of its promise to set up 350 beds for the state-run KS Roy TB Hospital which functions from the same compound.
The KPC authorities, however, denied the allegation saying they had long fulfilled their only commitment to the government — to construct six buildings for the tuberculosis hospital.
A health department official said KS Roy TB Hospital had 750 beds till 2004, when the plot on which it stood and some adjoining land were handed over to the KPC group. The group was allowed to run a medical college and in return it agreed to rebuild the TB hospital with six buildings and 350 beds.
“But KPC has arranged for only 220. We have written to the private group asking them to set up the remaining 130 beds immediately,” said V.R. Pradhan, the superintendent of KS Roy hospital.
The superintendent admitted that KPC had constructed six buildings for the TB hospital but said they were far from adequate. “We need at least one more building for the remaining 130 beds. Even the 220 beds KPC has created for us have been placed in a manner violating hospital norms. Beds for patients suffering from infectious diseases such as TB should be placed at least six feet from each other. But here the gap between two beds is less than three feet.”
Wards have been set up in four of the six buildings KPC has set up for the TB hospital. Of the rest, one is being used as the administrative block and the other is housing various diagnostic departments.
The TB hospital authorities also alleged that KPC was illegally occupying the building that housed the ward where poet Sukanta Bhattacharjee died on May 13, 1947.
“The building has been converted into residential quarters for the students of the nursing college run by the private hospital. They should immediately hand over the building to the TB hospital authorities,” a health department official said.
Denying the charges, the chief executive officer of KPC Medical College and Hospital, Bhaskar Ghosh, said: “The contract signed in 2004 required us to construct six buildings for the TB hospital. We have done that…. There was no mention in the contract about the ward where Sukanta Bhattacharjee had died.”
