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Tuesday March 19, 2024

‘Stoppage of Rs500 million for RIU may cost lives’

By Muhammad Qasim
April 22, 2018

Rawalpindi : Had there been no restriction on release of funds being provided for completion of under-construction Rawalpindi Institute of Urology here in town, the institute would have been made operational within this month.

The delay in establishment of RIU may cost lives as a number of patients may not be able to live normal lives without dialysis, kidney transplants and other like surgical procedures which would be available to both the poor and the rich at the institute that was about to get operational but after orders from Election Commission of Pakistan, the funds were stopped.

The PML-N central leader Muhammad Hanif Abbasi expressed this while talking to media persons in a press briefing here in a local banquet hall on Saturday. He said the completion of RIU needs Rs500 million of which an amount of Rs236 million was about to be released, but it was stopped after orders from the ECP.

“We were planning to inaugurate commissioning of outpatients department of RIU on April 25 and emergency department of the institute on April 30 but we have to stop the construction and completion work on RIU after stoppage of funds,” he said.

Almost all civil works have already been completed on the 300-bedded RIU being established on a piece of land measuring 96 kanals, he claimed. He added the furniture required for the RIU has already been prepared and the institute had to pick it just after payment to the contractor and if funds are available, the furniture would be picked up in two hours, he said.

He said the institute would have heat, ventilation and air conditioning based technology and almost all work in this regard has also been completed and the system was ready to be installed but we have to stop work on it after stoppage of funds.

Just like Rawalpindi Institute of Cardiology, the RIU would have a capacity to cater to the needs of thousands of patients not only from the Punjab province but also from other provinces and regions including Khyber Pakhtunkhwah and AJK, said Abbasi.

He said the RIU would provide facilities of dialysis along with complicated surgeries involving kidney and renal system and it would certainly be a state of the art institute like the RIC particularly on the subject of providing treatment facilities to the poor and the needy.

He said if the RIU is not made functional at the time, its completion may take more than a month as after general elections, the incumbent government would take time to give due attention to the project.

He added if the funds of Rs500 million required for completion of the RIU are released, the institute would start functioning within a month or so. “If I cannot make institute operational within May this year after release of funds at the time, I should be made responsible for ill-management.”

Hinting towards suo motu notices of Supreme Court of Pakistan, Abbasi said the concerned authorities should take notice of stoppage of funds being released for completion of RIU for the sake of general public and the patients requiring treatment facilities which are not available anywhere at public sector hospitals in the region.

Local leadership of the PML-N including MNA Malik Abrar, Mayor Sardar Nasim, Raja Hanif, Shakeel Awan and Ziaullah Shah were also present on the occasion.