The Telugu Desam and its electoral ally Bharatiya Janata Party virtually turned the inaugural ceremony of new Gandhi Hospital premises into an election meeting here on Friday.
The ground, which once housed Musheerabad Jail, was bustling with yellow and saffron banners. The yellow brigade carrying huge cut outs of the caretaker Chief Minister and TD flags went on chanting zindabad slogans for Naidu.
Significantly, the Telugu Desam supremo and his ministerial colleagues took maximum advantage of the imposing structure and sprawling new premises of the hospital to silence the voices criticising the Telugu Desam government of neglecting Telangana.
Speaker after speaker including Home Minister T Devender Goud, Panchayat Raj Minister Nagam Janardhan Reddy and Union Minister of State for Urban Development Bandaru Dattatreya explained how the caretaker Chief Minister took personal interest in making the new hospital into a world class health centre for poor people of Telangana.
It is a living example speaking volumes about our commitment to develop backward regions and provide health care for the poor people of the region, Home Minister said. Recollecting his old days when he slept in the stinking rooms of the hospital attending to his ailing father, Goud said inauguration of the new building would go down in history and the people of the region would forever remember Chandrababu Naidu.
Taking a dig at the Congress leaders, though indirectly, the Home Minister said despite several people from Telangana occupying highest positions in the government, the region did not achieve any development and it was only after TD’s emergence that backward areas were being developed.
Panchayat Raj Minister and Tourism Minister T Srinivas Yadav said poor people from the length and breadth of Telangana would be visiting Gandhi Hospital for treatment and they would be highly thankful to the caretaker chief minister for providing them world class facilities.
Naidu too played the Telangana card and said his government decided to develop Gandhi Hospital into a model hospital with the sole objective of providing advanced medicare to the people of Telangana.
Earlier, Naidu inaugurated the 10-storied hospital building and Gandhi Medical College building which were constructed on a sprawling 13 acre land which once housed Musheerabad Central Prison. The 1,600-bed hospital will soon be equipped with the state-of-the art equipment costing around Rs 20 crore.
Gandhi Medical College Batch of 92 Alumni Association "once a Gandhian always a Gandhian" Whatever the reason wherever they may be; many have made names for themselves in foreign lands and many have stayed behind to contribute substantively to the field of medicine in India. Venkata Krishna rao Bodavula
