Clinical Establishment, six other Bills passed in House

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab Vidhan Sabha on Friday unanimously passed seven bills, including the Clinical Establishment Bill during a special one-day session.

There was hardly any opposition to the Bills and all were passed as soon as the minister concerned tabled it on the floor of the House.

The legislation for setting up Sri Guru Teg Bahadur University of Law at Tarn Taran to commemorate the 400th birth anniversary of the Ninth Sikh Guru was tabled by higher education minister Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa.

The Bill says the government aims to establish and incorporate a state university for imparting specialised education, training and research in the field of law.

The assembly also unanimously approved the Punjab Good Conduct Prisoners (Temporary Release) Amendment Bill , 2020. Bajwa said the rationale behind bringing the legislation was to enable the jail department to take measures to decongest prisons, besides ensuring that the facilities remain Covid-19 free.

The assembly also passed the Punjab Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (Second Amendment) Bill, 2020. Presenting

the bill, finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal said in view of the serious negative impact of the pandemic on the resources of states, the government of India has decided to increase the borrowing limit up to 2.0 per cent of Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) for the year 2020-21, subject to implementation of specific state-level reforms. He said the motive was to strengthen resources of the state governments.

Punjab has been allowed an additional borrowing of ₹12,130 crore in 2020-21, over and above its net borrowing ceiling, which is 3% of GSDP. However, the relaxation in borrowing limit is partly unconditional to the extent of 0.5% and remaining 1.5% is conditional to the implementation of some steps, such as implementation of ‘one nation, one ration card’ system, ease of doing business reform, urban local body/utility reforms; and power sector reforms.

The assembly also gave nod to the Punjab Clinical Establishment (Registration and Regulation) Bill-2020. Presenting the Bill, health and family welfare minister Balbir Singh Sidhu said the aim of this enactment was to bring the clinical establishments under a regulatory mechanism for better transparency.

It also seeks to improve quality of public healthcare, prevent overcharging of patients and better management during pandemics and epidemics.

Sidhu, later said, the Bill will have the provision to bring only hospitals owned by non-doctors and or having more than 50-bed capacity under the legislation.

A delegation led by Punjab Chapter of Indian Medical Association (IMA) Dr Navjot Dahiya had also met the health minister on Thursday morning to ensure only non-doctor owned hospitals or those with more than 50-bed capacity comes under the regulation.

The assembly also approved the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) (Punjab Amendment) Bill, 2020 and the Industrial Disputes (Punjab Amendment) Bill, 2020. The Punjab Goods and Services Tax (Second Amendment) Bill, 2020, was also passed.

WITH CLINICAL ESTABLISHMENT BILL, GOVT AIMS TO IMPROVE QUALITY OF PUBLIC HEALTH CARE, PREVENT OVERCHARGING OF PATIENTS AND BETTER MANAGEMENT DURING PANDEMICS