One Rupee Clinics on CR to shut down

The One Rupee Clinic will meet an untimely death on the Central Railway line due conflict between authorities. The initiative has been running successfully for four months at railway stations along the Central line – eight clinics are currently functional and 11 more were in the offing on the Central and Harbour line. These will shut down in three days according to the founder Dr Rahul Ghule.

The reason for the termination of the programme, he says, is delay from the Railways in granting permission to set up the clinics within a station’s premises. This often depends on reclaiming the space by clearing hawkers. However, Sunil Udasi, chief public relations officer of Central Railway, says, “The One Rupee Clinics are functioning well. Neither the operator nor Central Railway has any issue with each other.”

“We wanted to serve the patients,” says Dr Ghule, “but due to politics and bureaucracy, we have failed to function properly. Due to these issues, we may not start them on the Western Line. We have invested over Rs 50 lakh in the project and wanted it to be an Emergency Medical Response (EMR) centre.”

The functioning eight clinics have seen a footfall of over 20,000 visitors in their …read more