Goenka Hospitals, promoted by Bhularam Education Society, plans to expand the bed capacity at its newly opened 100-bed Gandhinagar facility three-fold within 2011. Besides, it also has plans to start a medical college on site in fiscal 2012-13.
Ramesh Goenka promoted Bhularam Education Society entered the Gujarat market around seven years back and currently runs the Delhi Public School (DPS) in Gandhinagar. The Trust has now opened a 100-bed multi-speciality hospital at Piplaj, 4 kilometer off Gandhinagar over 20 acres of land that also has a dental college on site.
"We have invested around Rs 40 crore to set up the hospital and the Goenka Research Institute of Dental Science at Piplaj. We now plan to expand the capacity of the multi-speciality hospital to 300 bed in 2011, so that we can start a medical college there as well by 2012. We plan to enroll the first batch of students in the 2012-13 academic year", said Apporva Goenka, chairman of Goenka Hospital. He added that an additional investment of Rs 100 crore is lined up for expansion of hospital and the medical college. Nearly 70 per cent of the investment has come from the promoters who own the Mumbai-based privately held steel TMT bar making company Bhularam Metal Industries Pvt Ltd. Remaining funds have been raised as debt.
Goenka informed that the hospital will cater to 160 villages around Gandhinagar area, which has an estimated population size of 20-25 lakh people. "Nearly 70-75 per cent of the occupancy in all private hospitals comes from patients from the rural areas of North Gujarat and Rajasthan. We hope to attract a sizeable portion of patients from the adjoining rural areas around Gandhinagar who can now access medical facilities closer home instead of traveling to Ahmedabad", he added. Goenka hospital will start offering invasive cardiology services from January. It started operations today.