NEW DELHI: Delhi will have at least 350 new
mohalla clinics by the end of this year.
The government has identified and handed over 175 sites to the Public Works Department to begin the process of calling tenders to set up portable cabins for AAP’s flagship project. Sources said another 175 locations would be handed over to the construction agency in the next two days.
The new sites were shortlisted within 10 days of
chief minister Arvind Kejriwal personally inspecting three such locations in northwest Delhi’s Saraswati Vihar and Paschim Vihar areas. These sites had earlier been marked “non-feasible” for setting up the clinic, allegedly due to “space constraint”.
The CM, however, found that the suggested locations had huge vacant space, much more than what was required to build a clinic. He then ordered a joint inspection by senior officials of health,
PWD and land owning agencies of close to 600 locations, which were marked non-feasible.
The AAP government had promised to set up 1,000 affordable and accessible medical facilities within a year of assuming office but unavailability of land, regular run-ins with land owning agencies and delays in clearances proved major stumbling blocks.
According to officials, Delhi currently has 183 functional mohalla clinics. In fact, 25 new clinics became operational between July 4 and July 25.
While 84 mohalla clinics are being run from portable cabins, 99 are operated from rented premises.
File photo of Delhi CM
