Hyderabad, October 30: For 14 years, this tiny room at the corner of the Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station at Koti has seen poor patients from rural areas coming in. They get directed to proper and free medical treatment in the best city hospitals here.
However, the Centre for Traveller’s Aid for the Sick is on the verge of being evicted by the APSRTC which leases the space.
Run by Dr Patricia D Bidinger, the centre provides free counselling on AIDS awareness, family planning and lifestyle besides giving first aid to travellers.
But one of their main activities is scouting railway platforms for sick and poor people as well as homeless orphans and runaways.
“A lot of poor patients from the district come to the city looking for treatment but they don’t have a clue as to where go for a specific treatment. We take them in and direct them to government hospitals and in special cases to private hospitals as well. Many private hospitals provide free treatment to patients coming through us,” says Dr Bidinger.
One such was the case of Srinivas, an eight-year-old who had consumed phenyl in an attempt to commit suicide and was found in the bus stand, narrates M Sheshadri, a counsellor.
They rescued him and later even enrolled him into a private school. It was found the child had an abusive father and had lost his mother.
Seeing no way out, he had tried to kill himself. The organisation has also provided schooling for his brother, who was earlier a bonded labourer.
The RTC however wants the centre to vacate the space.
The centre had got the space for a small token rent for a lease period, which had to be renewed every two years. The lease expires on October 31 and the RT C refuses to renew it. “We had been paying Rs 6000 as rent and it would have increased to Rs 8000 which we were prepared to pay. But the APSRTC asked us to pay Rs 65,000 per month to keep the place. We do not have funds to pay such a huge rent,” said Dr Bidinger.
The RTC plans to give the space to a photocopy shop, according to Bidinger who says there is minimal need for a photocopy shop at a bus station. “The Traveller’s Aid project has been hailed as the most innovative service to foster health in developing countries and is now being copied in other cities in India and Africa. Why is the very first centre under threat?” asks Dr Bidinger.
Ravindrababu, APSRT C regional manager, Rangareddy district said, “The direction for eviction was issued because not much activity was happening in the organisation and they had no doctor. We get 1.2 lakh passengers every day and the bus station definitely needs a doctor.
However, if the government gives a GO in favour of the organisation, we will accept it.” Bidinger says ironically, “Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) drives big hospitals to give quality medical treatment to the poor for free. But does the RT C have any CSR?” She had filed a petition in the High Court and Justice Ramana issued a stay order for four weeks on Friday, after which another hearing will decide the centre’s future.
What led to this situation
*The Centre began operations in 1997, when the then MD/VC of the APSRTC, KC Mishra gave space to the organisation on a token rent and lease renewal every two years.
* His successor, Appa Rao deemed the space as commercial and said the organisation would have to bid for it like any other commercial venture.
* With the CM’s intervention, eviction had been stopped. But the issue cropped up again
–Agencies