Centre releases INR 817 crore for seven medical colleges in Odisha

The Centre has released INR 817 crore for the Odisha government for setting up seven new medical colleges in the state.

The Union Minister of State (MoS) for Health and Family Welfare Bharati Pravin Pawar has informed the Rajya Sabha that the Central government has given INR 817 crore to the Odisha government for setting up seven new medical colleges in the state.

She said that the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare launched a centrally-sponsored scheme (CSS) for setting up new medical colleges attached to existing district/referral hospitals. Under this scheme, medical colleges are established through 60:40 fund sharing between the Centre and the state and now Odisha has got the approval for 7 new medical colleges under this scheme.

Undergraduate medical courses started in 4 of these colleges

The new medical colleges will be at Baripada, Balasore, Koraput, Bolangir, Puri, Jajpur, and Bhawanipatna. Out of these seven colleges, the admission to MBBS course has been started in four colleges while at Puri, Jajpur, and Bhawanipatna, it is yet to begin, said sources, as reported by Orissa Post.

The Centre has approved INR 1,520 crore for these colleges and while the Centre will provide INR 912 crore, the Odisha government will contribute INR 608 crore.

The Health Ministry has released INR 817 crore to the state so far and it will provide INR 95 crore for the new medical college at Bhawanipatna in Kalahandi district. The minister has confirmed that the approved amount for all other six medical colleges has been given to the state.

As per the government data, INR 189 crore was approved for each medical college at Baripada, Balasore, Bolangir, Puri and Koraput and INR 250 crore was approved for the medical college at Jajpur and INR 325 crore for the medical college in Kalahandi district.

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