Rahman rhapsody for city hospital In what is bound to be music to the city’s ears, A.R. Rahman will be in Calcutta on Tuesday to raise funds for setting up a liver treatment and research centre off the Bypass.
The Oscar winning music composer will take part in a charity dinner and auction on Tuesday evening at a city hotel and perform at Salt Lake stadium on November 14. The proposed hospital, to be set up by the Liver Foundation of West Bengal at an estimated cost of Rs 20 crore, will have 100 beds. “The entire amount will be raised through donations and endorsement and Rahman is helping us,” said Abhijit Chowdhury, the secretary of the foundation and the director of the Institute of Liver Diseases at SSKM Hospital. The hospital is likely to be ready in two years. At the dinner, guitars signed by the *Jai Ho* musician and paintings by Kalyan Bose, the vice-president of the foundation, would be auctioned. “A number of organisations would also pledge money for the hospital during the programme,” Chowdhury said. The state government has given 1 acre at Madurdaha, off the Bypass (near the Ruby connector) for setting up the institute. “We want to develop the institute as a bridge between state-run and private hospitals. State hospitals do not provide proper care while treatment at private ones is out of reach of common people,” said a doctor involved with the project. A liver transplant at the hospital would cost around Rs 10 lakh against Rs 30 lakh charged by private hospitals, he added. Kalyan Bose of the foundation said he was elated with Rahman’s association with the cause. “These days Rahman only agrees to charity concerts. Out of 23 applications from this part of the country for holding a concert as part of his *Jai Ho* tour, he chose ours. We are honoured,” he said. On Tuesday, 200 Calcuttans will be part of the sit-down dinner at Hyatt Regency. The tickets to the dinner have been sold out and the organisers are “overwhelmed by Calcutta’s generosity”. -- regards, Vithur
