Faculty at Jamia Millia Islamia demands 500 bed hospital to be later converted to medical college

New Delhi: The Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) teachers' organisation has requested Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for setting up of a 500-bed hospital in the university so that it can later be turned into a medical college.

"When we look at certain areas, where we can improve upon or progress, we find that three of our contemporary universities like DU, BHU and AMU are successfully running the hospital and medical college," the Jamia Teachers' Association (JTA) said in the letter on February 25, reports PTI.

"We request you to establish a new 500 bedded hospital in Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) so that in (the) near future it could be converted into a medical college," it stated.

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The JTA raised the demand for the hospital with Kejriwal on Saturday when the Delhi Chief Minister met a few "locality intellectuals" at Okhla, which included varsity teachers.

"Although we are running the bachelor degree course in dentistry. But the JMI is forced to send students to other hospitals, as we do not have our own facility," JTA Secretary Majid Jamil wrote in the letter to the Chief Minister.

The JTA pointed out to the Minister that the university is situated in a densely-populated area, where more than 90 per cent of the population belongs to the Muslim community and many of them are underprivileged and desperately need quality medical facilities. "But they are not getting these services as there is no hospital nearby."

The hospital, the JTA said, would enhance the level of the university and lead to the accessibility of quality medical services at a very nominal cost to the neglected population residing in the university's vicinity.

The letter pointed out that JMI was running a bachelor's degree course in dentistry, but the students had to go to other hospitals to study medicine. Therefore, the JMI teachers' organisation has requested for setting up of a hospital to cater to the training needs of these dentistry students, according to a recent report by IANS.

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