Guwahati, Jan. 29: Seventy-five-year-old Himangshu Sharma will no longer be a lonely man. A retired government official, Sharma can look forward to shifting to the state?s first old-age home coming up here shortly.
Sharma does not mind shelling out a bit of money, provided his stay at the Ambikagiri Memorial Trust Old Age Home is a comfortable one.
The trust, instituted as a public charitable one to cherish the memory of author Ambikagiri Roychoudhury, will build the home in three phases, the first of which will start in April. The home will come up on a plot allotted by the government at Patharquarry in Narengi.
President of the trust Suchibrata Roychoudhury said here today that the home would have facilities like a recreation and hobby centre where elderly men and women could listen to music or watch a movie, with round-the-clock health aid and a variety of rooms to suit different age groups. Ambulance facilities will also be provided. A nature therapy centre with a horticultural garden is also being added.
In the first phase, there will be room for 11 people in an Assam-type house. The home will be open to persons aged above 60 years. A survey on the elderly in Assam has found that there are 12 lakh people who are more than 65 years of age of whom 4.5 lakh live below the poverty line. Six lakh people are in the middle income category.
?The inmates can work at the guidance-cum-counselling centre which will be opened to youths,? Roychoudhury said. ?The home will also be open to those people who would like to leave in the evening after spending the day there,? he added.
The monthly rate for a bed in the dormitory will be Rs 1,500, Rs 3,000 in a four-bed room and Rs 4,000 for a single room. ?We will even celebrate the inmates? birthdays to bring some happiness into their lives,? Roychoudhury said.
The trust had a tough time raising Rs 7 lakh in the first phase as the government expressed its inability to help. But if any individual or group provides the cost of construction of one unit, it would be named after the donor, the trust said.
It has set up a project management committee with a steering committee of 11 members.