Redevelopment of the Lady Hardinge Medical College is a Part of the Initiative Launched by the Union Ministry of Health & Family Welfare to Augment the Healthcare Services

Parts of the speech delivered by the Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare, Shri Ghulam Nabi Azad, here today on the occasion of the Foundation Stone Laying Ceremony by the Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, for the Redevelopment of Lady Hardinge Medical College:


"At the end of the 11^th Plan period and the beginning of the 12^th Plan, I have great pleasure in stating that the National Rural Health Mission, conceived by you and implemented under your leadership has done tremendously well.

40,000 new constructions and renovations of health facilities were taken up under NRHM, out of which 20,000 have already been completed and the rest are under various stages of completion.

Nearly 1.6 lakh personnel have been added to the health systems across the country for better health care delivery.

While we were at various stages of implementation of NRHM and other health related infrastructure schemes, we came across acute shortage of human resources in health.

Realizing this serious challenge in improving health services, we undertook a series of path breaking initiatives to increase the human resources at various levels; whether it was raising the retirement age of faculty and recognition of DNB qualification for overcoming shortage of faculty, relaxing the teacher-student ratio in PG courses to increase PG seats, Rationalization of land, infrastructure and bed occupancy norms, or increasing the intake of MBBS students.

To further strengthen tertiary Health Care delivery in the government sector, the Ministry also took up 19 state government owned medical colleges’for up-gradation under the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Surakhsha Yojana. 6 institutions have been completed and rest are likely to be completed by March-April 2013.

In 2013, together the 6 new AIIMS and 19 up-graded institutions would provide speciality and super-speciality care in all disciplines with a net addition of 11,390 beds covering 27 locations spread across the country.

To overcome the shortage of Nurses and ANMs, my Ministry has sanctioned 269 nursing schools with an outlay of Rs. 2,030 crores in the last two years, mostly in remote, inaccessible and under-served districts.

These institutions will give us an additional 20,000 nurses annually. 

To give a boost to para-medical education and scale up the availability of para-medics, we have sanctioned a National Institute of Paramedical Sciences (NIPS) at Delhi and 8 Regional Institutes.

A total of 10,760 paramedic professionals are expected to be trained annually when these institutes of excellence are fully functional.

With the enhanced public investment in the health sector, we will be able to address the shortcomings in infrastructure and human resources in the interest of providing equitable, accessible and affordable health care, especially in rural, remote and inaccessible areas of the country.”

Source : Press Information Bureau