North India's first government homoeopathy college, funded centrally, is set to be established in the Jasrota area of Jammu and Kashmir's Kathua district, announced Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Sunday.
The college will come up at a cost of about Rs 80 crore and will span over more than eight acres initially, with the potential expansion of three additional acres in the future," stated the Minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office.
"The proposed structure will include a hospital complex, a college, an administrative block, and a hostel each for male and female students," Singh said.
"The open space will be utilised later for the construction of an auditorium and a playground," the minister said as he visited the proposed site in the Jasrota village, where work on the boundary wall has already begun.
He was briefed about the institution by engineers and senior experts from the Department of Ayush.
Singh, who is seeking a third consecutive term in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls from Udhampur, said the agenda he took up after he was elected as MP in 2014 will continue uninterrupted till the date of the declaration of the Model Code of Conduct and resume immediately once the poll code is lifted.
He also expressed his gratitude to Prime Minister Narendra Modi before whom the requisition was placed and said it is a matter of pride for the people of Kathua that north India's first government homoeopathy college will come up at a cost of Rs 80 crore.
"It will not only be a great boon for aspirants of homoeopathy degree in north India, which was not available earlier, but it will also provide cost-effective treatment to needy patients," the minister said.
"It will be in keeping with the Modi government's healthcare approach, which involves synergising allopathy with Ayush streams of medicine, including homoeopathy, ayurveda and naturopathy," he added.
Singh said the experience after COVID-19 has further consolidated the view that traditional Indian methods of medicine and cure have panacea value.
Highlighting the medical infrastructure that has come up in Kathua in the past 10 years, Singh said the district now has a government medical college and a cancer treatment facility being provided by Tata Memorial Centre.
"The addition of a government homoeopathy college will make Kathua an integrated and cost-effective healthcare centre of north India in the time to come," he said.
He later told reporters that his first five-year term was devoted to making up for the lapses of previous governments, including the Shahpur Kandi project that had been held up for 30 years.
The second term, he said, was devoted to setting up new institutions such as centrally-funded government medical colleges, the first-ever seed processing plant, and the proposed homoeopathy college, among others.
"The next five-year term will be devoted to consolidating these gains and developing the region as north India's most attractive destination from the point of view of education, trade, tourism and revenue," Singh said, lashing out at his political opponents who alleged that the constituency has not seen any development during the past 10 years.
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