Mental hospital faces funds crunch migraine

State plans to modify Thane facility, but lacks funds to pay utility bills

Mental hospital faces funds crunch migraine

State plans to modify Thane facility, but lacks funds to pay utility bills

When the state is planning to modify Thane Mental Hospital on the lines of Nimhans, a premier mental health institute in Bangalore, it seems to have forgotten to meet the basic needs of the local facility.

The cash-strapped Thane hospital has not been able to clear power, water and grocery bills completely for the past two-three years.

The cash-strapped Thane hospital has not been able to clear power, water and grocery bills completely for the past two-three years

If the hospital is yet to pay Rs 50 lakh to Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) for power, it hasn't been able to clear water bills running into lakhs of rupees to Thane Municipal Corporation for the past three year.

Same is the case with grocery bills, which runs into a whopping Rs 2 crore.

But the hospital, facing paucity of funds, has been making partial payments during this span to avoid the embarrassment of going without power or water.

The MSEB has recently served a warning notice to the hospital asking to clear its pending power bills immediately.

And one should not take the power board's caution lightly as it had cut off supply to the facility last January because of non-payment of bills.

According to sources, the hospital has always been a defaulter in making payments owing to paucity of funds. The only way the authorities are managing the hospital is by making partial payments.
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"They pay off around 20 to 30 per cent of the total bill amount and owing to partial payment of bills, the bill keeps on accumulating over the years," said an official requesting anonymity.

The state delegation, which had gone to study infrastructure at Nimhans, has suggested various revamp plans, including open wards for the hospital, day care centres and provision to allow relatives to accompany the patients at the hospital.

All these ambitious plans are fine, but the need of the hour is to pay off the pending utility bills to ensure smooth functioning of the facility that houses around 1,463 patients.

The Other Side
Thane region Deputy Director (health services) Sanjiv Kamble said, "We are unable to pay off the bills as we do not having adequate funds. As soon as the government releases the grant, we shall clear the pending bills."
He added that the Centre funds would be released soon and they would be able to clear the bills within 15-20 days.

Asked why the hospital was sitting on the pending bills for so long, Medical Superinten-dent of Thane Mental Hospital Dr S Kumavat said, "There was a paucity of funds last year because the National Rural Health Mission did not make any budgetary provision for mental health last fiscal. But this year, we have been allocated adequate funds and we will soon pay off the bills."