CMYK

ND-ND

4 THE HINDU THURSDAY, AUGUST 28, 2014

NOIDA/DELHI

CITY/NCR

NEW DELHI: Resources and medicalpersonnel stretched beyond limitsand an infrastructure unable tobear the load – this is thecondition of the Capital’s premierchildren’s hospital, KalawatiSaran.

The 375-bed medical centre,located in the heart of the city,caters to the needs of poorchildren not just from Delhi, butmany Northern States as well. It isamong the largest children’shospitals in Asia with the largestneo-natal wing with 84 beds.

Parents coming to the hospitalcomplain that it ‘looks and feelsmore like a Mumbai chawl’. “Assoon as one walks into the medicalcentre, what you first encounter ischildren’s clothes, saris, towelsand bed-sheets spread out to dryon the railing and staircase area ofthe hospital,” said Bishen Singh,who had come to the hospital withhis one-year-old son from UttarPradesh.

It is also routine to see parentswaiting here allowing theirchildren to defecate and urinate inthe open.

“There is nothing in the hospitalto ensure that the small childrencoming here are kept occupied,like having a play area. For theparents, there is no waiting areaand the parking space oftendoubles up as the waiting area,”added Mr. Singh.

The space, staff and resourcecrunch at the hospital, however, isno deterrent to the parentsbringing their children.

“Medical staff at the hospitaloften go out of their way toaccommodate ailing children.They are an exception,” notedVandana from Gole Market, whosechild is under medicalinvestigation for recurring fever.

“The hospital staff [doctors/nurses/paramedics] are polite and

usually go out of their way toensure that the children arelooked after well. But yes there isacute staff shortage andsometimes parents have to doubleup as medical helpers at thehospital,” she added.

While the hospitaladministration refused to speakabout the issues, the NationalCommission for Protection ofChild Rights (NCPCR) in its reporthas confirmed that “inadequate

human resource” is one of themajor issues at the hospital.“Long-drawn recruitment policies,lack of strict and regularmonitoring of these institutions,growing patient load, lack ofsupport staff, and severe shortageof space are hitting the hospitalgrowth,” noted the report.

The NCPCR report titled‘Strengthening Health Institutionsfor Child Health: NCPCRInterventions August 2012-

November 2013’ notes: “Thehospital was found to have a bedoccupancy rate of almost 150 percent.”

“Besides this, there is shortageof support staff for cleaning,laundry, security and socialworkers, technicians, and nursingstaff. With a severe shortage ofspace and staff at all levels,especially of the supportiveparamedical care, doctors arehaving to double up for work that

is beyond their purview,” notedthe report.

Meanwhile, an expansionprogramme is underimplementation to accommodate1,000 patients. A senior healthofficer said: “One of the problemsat the hospital is lack of a full-timetechnician for attending instantlyto problems with equipment. Thishas resulted in delays andadditional work load on theexisting staff.”

Premier children’s hospital Kalawati Saran faces acute shortage of staff and resources. Butparents only have good things to say about it, discovers Bindu Shajan Perappadan

Harried staff ensure kids don't get step-motherly treatment

Though the staff goes out of its way to help its little patients,there is no designated waiting area for parents or play areafor children at the Kalawati Saran Children’s Hospital inNew Delhi. — PHOTOS: MONICA TIWARI

GURGAON: A day-long trainingprogramme, “The Civics andCitizenship”, was held atHeritage School here onWednesday. Attended by 50-odd teachers from schoolsacross the National CapitalRegion, the programme wasaimed at making the teachingof civics and political sciencemore interesting.

“Civics and political sci-ence are among the mostexciting subjects with directrelevance to daily events.Yet, the challenge for teach-ers is to keep the interest ofstudents alive, enable themto analyse events in an ob-jective way and to developpractical understanding ofgovernance systems,” saidVinita Singh of ‘We, the Peo-ple’, a network of individuals

and organisations workingtowards responsible citizen-ship. The programme wasorganised jointly by ‘We, thePeople’ and The HeritageSchool.

Major challenges

The teachers present inthe programme said the ma-jor challenges before themwere the vast syllabus andlack of student interest to-

wards the subject. They,however, added that stu-dents today were moreaware and keen to learn.Some of the teachers felt thetwo subjects lacked careeroptions, making the studentslose interest in them.

Pushkar Abbi, a politicalscience teacher at The Heri-tage School, shared how hisstudents took up the issue ofgarbage at Sadar Bazaar in

Gurgaon with the MunicipalCorporation of Gurgaon offi-cials, and how it changedtheir mindset towards thesystem.

Vishnu Karthik, the asso-ciate director (projects) atThe Heritage School, saidteachers should not worrytoo much about completingthe syllabus, but aim at mak-ing the students understandit.

Making civics and political science more exciting for studentsAshok Kumar

NEW DELHI: The All-India In-stitute of Medical Sciencesstudents’ union has ex-pressed solidarity with for-mer Chief Vigilance OfficerSanjiv Chaturvedi who wasrecently transferred fromthe post by the Union HealthMinistry.

A signature campaign car-ried out by the students’union noted that “they standby this honest officer andcondemn Mr. Chaturvedi’sremoval from the CVOpost”.

Demand

“We demand the cancella-tion of the order removingMr. Chaturvedi so that hecan continue his fightagainst corruption at our In-stitute,” noted a press re-lease issued by the students’union here on Wednesday.

“Impeccable integrityand honesty”

Stating that stripping theIFS officer off the CVOcharge at AIIMS will affectthe cases he was fighting for,the students noted: “Manyof these cases are in action-able stages, wherein respon-sibility has to be fixed andculprits punished. His re-moval has opened doors forall those culprits to go scotfree.”

The students said the IFSofficer is well-known as anofficer with impeccable in-tegrity and honesty.

“Mr. Chaturvedi is quitewell known for unearthingcorruption cases in his two-year tenure at AIIMS, doingexactly what he was meantto as the main anti-graftwatchdog.”

Signaturecampaign for formerAIIMS CVO

Bindu Shajan Perappadan

Sanjiv Chaturvedi

BRIEFLY

A squirrel, parrots and pigeons feeding togetheron a hot Wednesday afternoon in New Delhi. — PHOTO: SHANKER CHAKRAVARTY

Fire at HCL office complex

NOIDA: A fire broke out in the basement of an under-construction building inside HCL’s office complex inSector 126 here on Wednesday evening. Police officers said there were no injuries as the labourerspresent at the site left the building in time. “Since the building is still under construction, all foursides were open and the fire personnel could control theblaze within one hour,” said a Noida Police constable, whowas present at the technology giant’s office. The blaze was doused with the help of eight fire tendersafter a call was made to the emergency services at 9 p.m.

Krishna Nagar getsfacility for the elderlyNEW DELHI: Union HealthMinister Harsh Vardhaninaugurated a seniorcitizens’ recreation centrein his erstwhile DelhiAssembly constituency ofKrishna Nagar onWednesday. The centre has facilitieslike a TV viewing area andreading area.

Five new undergroundreservoirs for cityNEW DELHI: This summer,seven lakh people havebenefitted from the DelhiJal Board commissioningfive new undergroundreservoirs. Three more are expected tostart by the year-end. EightUGRs will be a record forus,” said Jal Board member(Water Supply) B.M. Dhaul.