Railway Medical College' still remains a daydream

The setting up of the much awaited Railway Medical college in Mysore has still remained a daydream for the past three years, thereby dashing the hopes of hundreds of Railway employees who dreamt of sending their children to medical college to become Doctors.

The main reason for the delay is the lack of coordination among various Departments in the Railway Board who are responsible for implementing the plan. Many of the railway employees to expressed displeasure for the inordinate delay in completing the formalities.

The proposal for setting up a Railway Medical College was approved in 2009-10 Railway Budget, by the then Minister of Railways Mamata Banerjee in 14 places across county including Mysore.

As per the proposal, South Western Railway (SWR) has to identify 25 acres of land for setting up the college, but till date they have identified only18 acres of land at Railway Workshop in Ashokapuram.

Though SWR has failed to provide the required 25 acres of land, they are planning to convince the Medical Council of India (MCI) and get permission for the construction of campus in the 18 acres of land which has been notified.

SWR Senior Divisional Commercial Manager, Dr Anup Dayanand Sadhu said that they are yet to receive the order from head-quarters. But once they receive the same, Expression of Interest (EoI) will be announced and construction work will be taken up under the Public Private Partnership (PPP).

However Railway Officials were determined to complete the project and not allow the sanction to be either transferred or canceled and were confident of taking up the works as soon as the approval is granted.