CHENNAI: To secure gold rings that will be gifted to every newborn in government hospitals under the ‘Thaimaman Thanga Mothiram Thittam’, health secretary Darez Ahamed has instructed PWD officials to fortify storage cupboards at 107 High-Load Comprehensive Emergency Obstetric and Newborn Care centres. From these hub units the rings will be transported to spoke hospitals.
The work should be completed by September 5, ahead of the scheme’s launch on September 15. The development comes as the government has finalised the jewellery firm to provide 4.41 lakh rings in 2026-27. The letter by the health secretary to PWD, on August 21, states that the windows in the storage room should be permanently sealed, and the cupboard should be firmly anchored to the floor and wall, apart from installing a suitable metal grill around the cupboard.
Reacting to the government’s plan for safekeeping of the rings, Service Doctors and Post Graduates Association (SDPGA) has urged the department to route the scheme through scheduled banks instead of making heads of government hospitals custodians of the gold, arguing that the additional responsibility would divert them from clinical care.
SDPGA, which had earlier raised concerns over the move, has proposed a bank-based mechanism that it says would reduce costs and allow health personnel to focus on maternal and newborn care. In a representation to the health secretary, the association suggested that beneficiaries be allowed to collect the rings from empanelled banks against PICME-linked entitlement certificates.
Alternatively, banks could handle storage and transportation under an MoU with the government. SDPGA estimated that the hospital-based storage and security arrangement would entail district-level administrative and security expenditure of around Rs 84.2 lakh annually.