Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh on Friday ordered a high-level probe into the functioning of the three Skill Development Centres set up in the medical colleges of Amritsar, Patiala and Faridkot.
The orders came after the Chief Minister was informed that these facilities, set up at a whopping Rs 18 crores, were lying idle.
A three-member committee, headed by Principal Secretary Medical Education and Research Sanjay Kumar, has been tasked with conducting a thorough enquiry into the functioning of these centres.
Other members of the committee are Skill Development Mission secretary Bhawna Garg, and Research Medical Education director Avnish Kumar.
The probe, aimed at ensuring accountability and improving efficiencies in medical training institutions, was necessitated by complaints that the facilities were lying vacant and there were no students, while the private companies to whom prime government land had been provided to run skill development centres were violating their contract conditions. PIMS had already invested Rs six crores each at GMC Patiala, Amritsar and Faridkot for creation of infrastructure, the state Health Minister Brahm Mohindra earlier informed the Chief Minister at the 36th Governing Body Meeting of Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS).
Chairing the meeting, Capt Amarinder also accepted the suggestion for implementing National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration laboratories (NABl) standards in all government medical colleges and hospitals in the state.
The Chief Minister said that the state government was duty-bound to provide students with quality medical education to facilitate their gainful employment and nobody would be allowed to jeopardize their future.
Capt Amarinder agreed that the PIMS and PMEC issues needed urgent redressal saying that his government was committed to find a viable solution. The government would further strengthen the mechanism to ensure quality skill education to medical students, he added.
On the issues of relaxation being sought by PIMS Medical and Education Charitable (PMEC) Society in the concession agreement, Chief Minister directed the steering committee to relook the issue in the light of fresh recommendations by the Vijay Kelkar Committee on Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model before seeking a legal opinion.
Capt Amarinder also referred the matter of refund of electricity charges by PMEC Society Jalandhar to the steering committee headed by the Chief Secretary.