22 April 2005	Friday	12 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1426

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MULTAN, April 21: The abandoned Fatima Jinnah Women Hospital is to be restored as a hospital of gynaecology under the Women Health Project funded by the Asian Development Bank. Khwaja Jalaluddin Roomi, the chairman of the board of management of the Nishter Medical College, told Dawn here on Thursday that the PC-1 of the FJWH rehabilitation project had been submitted to the provincial government.

He said initially an ADB grant of Rs12.7 million would be extended for the venture under the WHP. He said the proposed hospital would start working as 25-bed facility, which would later be enhanced to the 40-bed.

Mr Roomi said the FJWHs rehabilitation project was proposed by the NMC&H BoM to lessen pressure of the patients at the gynaecology department of the Nishter hospital. He said apart from the ADB grant, the provincial and district governments would also contribute to the FJWH’s rehabilitation project.

He, however, said it had yet to be decided that whether the gynaecology hospital would work under the NMC&H or the district health department.

When asked about the stance of NMC&H BoM’s on the sexual harassment incident involving an orthopaedic surgeon of the hospital, Mr Roomi iterated that the Nishter’s BoM had never been by asked the provincial health department to submit a report on the incident.

He said on Wednesday he was in Lahore only to attend a meeting about the FJWH’s rehabilitation. However, he said, the NMC&H BoM backed the report submitted by the hospital’s principal executive officer Prof Dr Shabbir Nasir which he had attached while forwarding the complaint of sexual harassment to the provincial health department authorities.

Dr Nasir had discussed the report with me before sending it to the authorities concerned, he added.

It may be added here that after receiving the complaint and the preliminary findings of the NMC&H management, the provincial health department authorities had reportedly recommended suspension of the orthopedic surgeon allegedly involved in the sexual harassment of a woman patient.

However, the matter hit by snags at the CMs secretariat.