Surjya Kanta Mishra coming out of the nursing home. Picture by Surajit Roy

Malda, Dec. 21: Surjya Kanta Mishra is out to streamline the health sector.

The state health minister is particularly vexed with a section of doctors whom he today criticised for not executing their duties properly. ?Even us, ministers, are accountable to people and our work is being evaluated by the party. As for doctors employed by the state health directorate, we have no other option but to keep a record of their duties,? said Mishra at the inaugural ceremony of a nursing home at Hyderpur here today.

According to him, his department has started compiling a computerised database on the performance of every physician and surgeon. ?We have come to know about a particular surgeon who, in the past one year, had performed only 10 to 12 operations in a government hospital while he had done three to four surgeries a day at private nursing homes,? Mishra said.

The minister said the government will question the integrity of the physicians it employed. ?They will draw handsome salaries but not perform to their ability ? this will not do anymore,? Mishra warned. ?From now on, each doctor will be evaluated.?

He also cautioned the doctors about the medicines they prescribed. ?We have often found that drugs manufactured by multinationals are being prescribed and the doctors even suggest the name of the companies. But most of the times, the drugs stocked in hospitals can deal with the illness. I am requesting you to stop this practice,? Mishra said.

About having more medical colleges in the state, Mishra said the Centre?s regulations were a major impediment in the direction. ?The Medical Council of India has very strange rules. According to its norms, a medical college has to be set up on a 25-acre campus. We have told them that our hospitals do not have that much of space, but they would not listen,? he said. ?I go to Delhi each year to drive some sense into them, but every time I find a new Union health minister.?

He, however, said two new medical colleges will be set up soon, one of which will be founded at Kalyani in Nadia.