Foundation for new RGUHS campus to be laid in August

Ten years after the plan to shift the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) from Bengaluru was first approved, the foundation stone for the new campus in Archakarahalli, Ramanagaram, will be laid in the first week of August.

On Wednesday, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah held a meeting at his home office “Krishna” to discuss the shifting of RGUHS. The meeting was attended by Medical Education Minister Dr Sharanprakash Patil, Energy Minister and Ramanagaram district in-charge-minister D K Shivakumar, MP D K Suresh, a representative of RGUHS, and other officials.

The RGUHS campus will be spread across 240 acres and will be developed as a ‘Health City’ and construction will begin in August.

The campus will house a medical college attached to a hospital, a superspecialty hospital, a dental college, a nursing college, a pharmacy college, hostels for male and female students, and staff quarters. A total of 16 buildings are to come up on the campus.

The university has been instructed to transfer funds required for the construction to the Public Works Department (PWD).

Of the 240 acres earmarked for the campus, around 77 acres of land are under litigation over compensation to landowners.

Farmers had protested and approached the Supreme Court as they were dissatisfied with the compensation offered to them.

At the meeting, it was decided that construction of 10 buildings on the land which is free of litigation should begin in August.

The chief minister instructed officials of the Karnataka Industrial Areas Development Board to speak to the advocate general to sort out the matter.