04-05-2025
MGM buildings a death trap, say junior doctors
Jamshedpur: The collapse of the dilapidated balcony from the third floor of the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College and Hospital (MGMMCH) is primarily the fault of the hospital management, according to several stakeholders and politicians.
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The three-storey building, which houses the children's ward on the ground floor, the gynaecology ward on the first floor and the medicine ward on the second and third floors, is a six-decade-old structure.
Built in 1961, the medicine block has been experiencing considerable damage over time with reports of plaster falling from the ceiling of the building appearing in the media regularly. The building was last repaired in the 2022-23 period for Rs 39 lakh but officials have said the repair was not properly done.
About six months after the repair, plaster of the ceiling disintegrated in several places and seepage occurred. The employees at the ward, particularly the cleaning staff and the patients, brought the matter to the knowledge of the authorities but there was no action.
At least on 10 different occasions in last two years, reports of the falling plaster from the three buildings appeared in the media.
"For the last nine years, I have been raising the issue of the dilapidated building with the hospital management and the building construction department, but nothing worthwhile has happened.
The balcony collapse incident has exposed the state of affairs of the govt hospital," Jamshedpur (West) MLA Saryu Roy.
The MGMMCH Junior Doctors' Association president, Dr Ganesh Shrivastav, said all three connected buildings of MGMMCH are in a broken-down state, inviting risk to the lives of the hospital staff, patients and visitors.
"It wouldn't be incorrect to say that the wards n the three old buildings are death traps," Dr Shrivastav said.
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A senior doctor at the gynaecology ward said on condition of anonymity that the state health secretary was eager to shift the OPD and the indoor services to the new hospital at Dimna but due to the lackadaisical approach of the hospital authorities, the shifting couldn't be done, so far.
