New Delhi: Urging the Government to
withdraw the Valianathan Committee report, which recommends
institutional autonomy of AIIMS, JD(U) chief Sharad Yadav
today said it should be relegated to the "dust bin", else
there would be an agitation against the move.
"There is a move to reinvent AIIMS in a corporate
mould in the form of the implementation of Valianathan
Committee, which has sought its conversion from a people's
institute to an institute serving corporate interests.
"It has recommended that members of the pharma
industry and business bodies be impanelled on the research
council and decision making bodies of AIIMS at different
levels in consultation with bodies like FICCI, CII and
ASSOCHAM," Yadav told reporters here.
Accusing Valianathan of being hand-in-glove with the
corporates, Yadav said though the committee's suggestions
have been opposed by AIIMS' governing body, Health Minister
Ghulam Nabi Azad said in Lok Sabha that most of these have
been accepted by government in principle.
"The government should take back the committee's
recommendations otherwise there will be an agitation against
it (move to implement suggestions). I will talk to other
parties also on the issue and will agitate against it... It
(the report) should be thrown in the dust bin as it will take
the institute away from the poor," he said.
Yadav added: the "committee tries to commit AIIMS to a
revenue generation model under the guise of promoting
institutional autonomy. It has tried to promote conditions
that would lead to distortions in health care. The
recommendations, if implemented, will promote medical tourism
for the coming generations".
PTI
First Published: Thursday, December 24, 2009, 21:29