Minister Health, Ramchandra Chandravanshi on Monday placed foundation stone for drug de-addiction centre at Ranchi Institute of Neuro-Psychiatry and Allied Sciences and inaugurated transit home for women who await their assimilation in the main stream of the society after getting cured at the institution.
The drug de-addiction centre will be a multi-storey (G+2) building and would cost around Rs 7-crore with the capacity to house 85 patients. The second dedicated facility after one at Central Institute of Psychiatry for alcohol loving state is expected to be ready in 24-months and will assist RINPAS in focusing on drug addicts better than before.
“Earlier such patients were housed in Psychiatry ward and they used to mix-up with other patients. Besides that ward lacked many other facilities needed for rehabilitation of addicts,” said Director, RINPAS, Amool Ranjan.
The addiction centre comes as a boon for RINPAS as it segregates a usual patient from an addict who needs around 3-5 weeks for rehabilitation including 15 days of process of detoxification. The institution treats around 700 drug addicts annually.
The Minister dedicated a transit shelter for women on their way back to the society after treatment.
The shelter known as ‘Halfway Home’ is 60-bed facility especially for female and has been constructed at an estimated cost of RS3.75-crore.
Moreover, Chandravanshi inspected facilities at RINPAS, interacted with patients and staffs besides inaugurating Medical library which has been made at the cost of Rs1.5-crore.
Meanwhile, the Minister expressed that the incumbent Director will continue in the present role until a regular director is selected by the department and expressed satisfaction with the work of the Director RINPAS. Nonetheless, Chandravnashi confided that the department will float another advertisement for the post with revived criteria for the head of the institution.
“Applications were submitted against the advertisement however no suitable candidate could be found because of the certain criteria related to the experience for the post. We will issue re-advertisement for the post,” said Chandravanshi.
Notably, the RINPAS has been functioning without a regular head since 2007 after the then Director, Brigadier (Retd) PK Chakraborty had vacated the post. The department had published first advertisement in June, 2007 and the institution has been led by three acting heads since then including the present Director.
The department had attempted to appoint a fulltime Director in 2010, 2011 and 2013 through advertisements but failed to find any suitable person to lead the institution.