Polyclinic expansion unlikely this fiscal year

Islamabad : The Supreme Court’s intervention may be welcome but the start of the Federal Government Services Hospital’s long-delayed expansion during the current financial year is a highly unlikely prospect.

The reason is that the 2018-19 budget unveiled by the last, PML-N-led federal government has no money for the plan under which the congested and overcrowded Polyclinic, as the hospital is popularly known, is to be expanded on 2.54 acres of land, including one third of Argentina Park and intervening road.

Planned over a decade ago, the hospital’s expansion has been stuck in limbo due to the bureaucratic red tape and litigation.

The city’s civic agency, CDA, too, had long put a spanner in the works by denying hospital the park’s land notwithstanding the orders of the successive prime ministers and Argentinean government’s consent. Having been driven from pillar to post, the Polyclinic finally got the land’s possession last year on the payment of its cost to the CDA. And even funds were released for the preparation of PC-I and feasibility report. However, here it planned the ceremonial breaking of the ground to begin work on the mega public health project, there some nearby residents knocked the plan on the head by securing a stay order from the high court against it over serious environmental harms. Also, the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency has challenged the plan in the court for 'not being eco-friendly'.

The administration, which didn’t hold out much hope of an early start of work on expansion plan, felt pleased on Sunday when Supreme Court Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar, during a visit to the hospital, promised to ‘play a role’ in the stay order’s vacation.

However, a senior official of the administration said he was not very optimistic about the outcome of the CJ’s intervention in the matter.

“Even if the Supreme Court chief justice gets the Islamabad High Court’s stay order against expansion vacated, it seems that work on the project won’t take place this fiscal due to the non-allocation of funds for it in the budget,” he told ‘The News’. He, however, hasted to add that if the CJ ordered as he did in some other health matters, the government could provide funds for the project and thus, ensuring its early execution.

When contacted, spokesman for Polyclinic Dr Sharif Astori appreciated the CJ’s intervention and said the administration kept its fingers crossed about the early start of work on the hospital’s expansion. He confirmed that the current financial year had no budgetary allocations for the project.