The AIIMS I know

Health Minister of India Anbumani Ramadoss recently launched a tirade against the management and functioning of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences. Ramadoss belongs to the PMK in Tamil Nadu. This small political group has only six Lok Sabha seats and one Rajya Sabha seat, obtaining only 5.6 per cent of the total votes polled in the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections of April-May 2006. If Ramadoss with such an unremarkable political profile can malign a medical institute of repute, I, as a senior citizen, would like to share my experience of the AIIMS and its prestigious Rajendra Prasad Ophthalmic Centre in particular. I am a frequent visitor to these places for treatment of ailments associated with old age.

Unlike powerful politicians and bureaucrats, I do not receive the special concessions given to VIPs. Yet AIIMS has impressed me as an institution of excellence providing life-saving services to the most vulnerable. To begin with, in spite of chronic over-crowding, a patient is treated like a very special person by the doctors and support staff. Two, it is worth looking at the social profile of the majority of patients who receive treatment at the AIIMS every day. The Rajendra Prasad Ophthalmic Centre is always crowded with patients belonging to the lower middle class, who come from small towns and backward regions of the country. I can say on the basis of my personal experience that the doctors, nurses and para-medical staff treat every patient without class bias.

Recently when I was admitted for investigations into my eye problem I saw a doctor spend time with a small child evidently from the lower middle class who had lost one eye. The doctor was visibly straining hard to arrive at a line of treatment to save the child8217;s other eye. Politicians who meddle in AIIMS need to be reminded that patients belonging to the underclasses of India are seen every day in its general wards. The poorest do not carry any 8216;recommendation8217; from VIPs. They approach the doctors on their own because they have faith in them.

The political campaign against it may end up delegitimising this institute. The politics seemingly practised by Ramadoss8217;s party and other Dravidian political shops in Tamil Nadu has already created a fertile ground in that state for the establishment of private or capitation fee-based medical and educational institutions. The privatisation of medical services has become a lucrative business and MPs, MLAs and even retired bureaucrats are involved in the exercise to earn huge profits by squeezing the pockets of parents ready to pay for education as for any other 8216;commodity8217;.

It is the duty of alert citizens to defend prestigious public institutions from political agendas determined to promote the privatisation of public services by defaming public institutions like the AIIMS.