Beneficiaries are left in the lurch as ESIC delays take-over of ESIS hospital at Gorimedu

The delay on the part of the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation in taking over the administration of Employees’ State Insurance Scheme Hospital at Gorimedu has caused concern among a large number of ESIC-insured persons and other beneficiaries in Puducherry

The delay on the part of the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) in taking over the administration of Employees’ State Insurance Scheme Hospital at Gorimedu has caused concern among a large number of ESIC-insured persons and other beneficiaries in Puducherry. 

It is almost five years since the Puducherry administration agreed to give the ESIC 5. 6 more acres of land to develop the healthcare centre as a model hospital and establish a super specialty block therein.

After the Congress government gave its concurrence, the then Lt. Governor, Kiran Bedi, issued an order in 2018 to hand over the land to the ESIC. She also gave consent to the signing of a memorandum of understanding with the ESIC for the development of the hospital. 

In fact, during a visit to Puducherry in 2018, the then Union Minister of State for Labour and Employment (Independent Charge), Santosh Kumar Gangwar, had acknowledged the Union government’s willingness to establish a super specialty block at the hospital after the ESIC took it over. 

“We have not heard anything thereafter. Consequently, the manpower and infrastructure requirements of the hospital have been neglected. The Health Department deputes its medical and para-medical staff to the ESIS Hospital. The department itself is finding it difficult to manage the requirements of its healthcare centres. There is a severe shortage of staff on several days, and the patients are referred to JIPMER or private hospitals,” said a staff member of the ESIS Hospital.

A visit to the hospital showed most of the in-patient wards were empty and the duty room of the doctors were closed. The hospital can admit 75 patients and has an operation theatre and an X-ray room. 

The staff members complained that the machines at the hospital were old and outdated. “Sometimes, we have to refer people who come with even minor industrial accidents to JIPMER or private hospitals for lack of doctors and specialists. There is also a shortage of medicines,” one of them said.