Health Minister Mohammad Nasim yesterday said Chittagong Medical College (CMC) would not be transformed into a medical university, but rather the government would establish a separate one.

He said the operation of Chittagong Medical University would start immediately after the bill in this regard was passed in parliament.

He made the comment while addressing a discussion at CMC, organised by Chittagong district and CMC units of Swadhinata Chikitsok Parishad (Swachip).

Speaking as special guest, Housing and Public Affairs Minister Mosharraf Hossain said the prime minister did not want the conversion as Chittagong Medical College Hospital (CMCH) served the poor  and feared that they would be deprived of healthcare if it became a university.

So she wants a separate medical university in Chittagong, he said.

"We have lands in Chittagong and I hope the construction of the medical university will start in a separate place soon after the bill of the Chittagong Medical University Act is passed in parliament," he said.

Meanwhile, the health minister came down heavily on the government doctors who do not want to go to remote areas and wish to stay in the capital.

"There is a medical university in Dhaka where doctors outnumber patients," he said.

In the same breath, he praised the doctors who saved the life of a child who was injured by a bullet in the womb of her mother in Magura.

"We have such doctors who saved the child and her mother by their cordial and relentless service; on the contrary, there are also doctors who are involved in corruption."

"I have information that many doctors posted at the upazila level are not discharging their duties properly," he said, urging the civil surgeons to keep a watch on those doctors.

Nasim said vehicles would be given to female doctors working at the upazila level immediately.

The minister said CMCH's wards would get some modern machinery shortly and urged the doctors to take good care of the equipment.

"It will unacceptable if you make the machinery inoperative and send patients to clinics," he said, warning, "If you do that, it will be a crime."