Express News Service
Bone marrow transplant at government hospital
Although the government provides Rs 5 lakh assistance for patients in need of bone marrow transplants, no state-run hospital was providing the facility till last month. Recently, IGIMS in Patna successfully carried out the procedure in a patient from Khagaria district. The transplant was conducted by IGIMS medical oncologist Dr Avinash Pandey, who previously served as assistant professor at Mumbai’s Tata Memorial Hospital and AIIMS in New Delhi. The patient, Bijay Kumar Ranjan, did not have to pay for the whole process. IGIMS director NR Biswas said six more patients will undergo stem cell transplant at the hospital.
Second bridge to come up across Ganga
Road connectivity between northern and southern Bihar is set to get a boost as plans are ready for the construction of a second bridge across the Ganga. The Gandhi Setu — connecting Patna to Hajipur — is undergoing elaborate repair. The government’s proposal for the new bridge, which would be 14.5 km long and cost K2,961 crore, was approved by the Public Investment Board (PIB) earlier this week. It will have four lanes and extend from Zero Mile in Patna till Ramashish Chowk in Hajipur. Road construction minister Nand Kishore Yadav said it would be an extra-dosed cable-stayed bridge with each span 242 metre long. Work on the project, a part of the special package announced by PM Narendra Modi in 2015, may start in March next year.
Of rats and politics
With torrential rains in northern Bihar putting the rivers in spate, the political blame game took an uncanny turn. Soon after water resources minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh assured that all the embankments are fine, Opposition leader Tejashwi Yadav asked the minister if there were any special plan for rats. Tejashwi was hinting to Singh’s controversial explanation last year that an embankment had caved in because rats had dug holes in it. “The rats are now busy collecting papers of IRCTC,” Singh shot back in clear allusion to the IRCTC tender scam in which Tejashwi and his parents were summoned by a CBI court. Also, officials had last year claimed that rats finished much of the illegal liquor stored at police stations
Saving energy is priority for JPNI Airport
Authorities of Jayaprakash Narayan International (JPNI) Airport in Patna are determined to reduce energy bills. The JPNI Airport management has signed an MoU with Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) to bring about a number of changes for ensuring an annual savings of about K15.59 lakh. As part of the exercise, all old-model ACs will be replaced with energy-efficient ones. About 1,000 indoor tube lights and panel lights will be replaced with LEDs. Nearly 200 streetlights and outdoor lights on the airport premises will also be replaced with LEDs. Work on the project starts this month and will be completed in three months. Similar projects are implemented at all the 126 airports in the country.
Anand st das: Our correspondent in Bihar
