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Pending Salaries: Strike by Medicos in Delhi’s Hindu Rao Hospital Enters Third Day

Doctors of Kasturba Hospital have also threatened to go on strike due to non-payment of salaries. They are reportedly planning mass resignations in protest.
Hindurao

The indefinite strike by Resident Doctors Association (RDA) of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation-run Hindu Rao Hospital entered the third day on Tuesday demanding pending salaries. The resident doctors on Sunday withdrew from work after the administration failed to meet the deadline for releasing their salaries.

"More than 200 resident doctors and over 300 nursing staff are on an indefinite strike since October 5. The administration has not paid our salaries for three months. It is difficult to continue working like this," RDA president Abhimanyu Sardana said.

The RDA had on Friday threatened to withdraw their services if the administration did not pay their salaries within 48 hours. The deadline expired on Sunday morning.

In a letter to the administration, the resident doctors had warned that they would desist from all COVID-related services that have been provided so far if the pending salaries were not cleared in the next 48 hours that ended on Sunday morning.

“An emolument is an imperative way to enliven ones’ attitude but due to the negligence by the administration for 3.5 months, it seems more like penal servitude than moral discipline,” read the letter.

“This is in all physiological and psychical ways too dispiriting and heart-wrecking and we would like to regrettably disengage from the Covid facility…”.

“We are tormented in ways to surpass our ethics of being called as skilled workers to public demonstrators seeking our primitive right to be remunerated,” it said.

“There is no response from the side of authority,” as of Tuesday noon, Sardana told Newsclick ,adding that the doctors would intensify the protest in coming days.

Meanwhile, in an order issued on Tuesday, the Delhi government's health department said that Bara Hindu Rao Hospital was being removed from the list of designated COVID hospitals in the Capital.

"A request has been received from the Commissioner, North Delhi Municipal Corporation for converting the Bara Hindu Rao Hospital to a non-COVID hospital,” the order said, according to a PTI report.

"The matter has been examined and in view of the low average bed occupancy of the hospital and request received from the NDMC, the hospital is being removed from the list of designated COVID-19 hospitals with immediate effect," the order said.

Bara Hindu Rao hospital, run by the North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), is the biggest municipal hospital in Delhi with 900 beds and was designated a dedicated COVID-19 treatment facility since mid-June when Delhi had witnessed a surge in number of positive cases. Many of its healthcare workers had also contracted the infection earlier.

The protesting medicos, however, are garnering support from various quarters. “Doctors are banging thaalis on the entry gate of Hindu Rao Hospital but no one is listening. They are not paid from last 4 months & are forced to live on debt. In rest of the world Covid Warriors are rewarded whereas in India they are humiliated,” tweeted Dr Harjit Singh Bhatti, national president of Progressive Medicos and Scientists Forum (PMSF).

The Federation of Resident Doctors Association of India (FORDA) has also extended solidarity to the protesting medicos.  “The Medical fraternity stands together in this national response to COVID-19 Epidemic and Doctors and other healthcare professionals are putting in their best efforts While fighting at the frontline, many have been infected with the virus and some our colleagues have unfortunately succumbed. Under the current circumstances, it is extremely disheartening that Resident Doctors of North MCD Hospitals of Delhi have not received their salaries since almost 4 months and it has become difficult for them to meet their daily expenditures and to support their families,” said FORDA press release.

The authorities on Saturday shifted 20 COVID-19 patients from Hindu Rao hospital to Delhi government-run facilities, with Health Minister Satyendar Jain saying that the Bharatiya Janata Party-led civic body should "hand over" municipal hospitals to the Aam Aadmi Party-led Delhi government if it cannot run these.

At present, there are three critically ill patients at the hospital who are being taken care of by senior doctors.

North Delhi Mayor Jai Prakash had on Saturday alleged that crores of funds were due to the North Delhi Municipal Corporation from the Delhi government, which they were "not paying to handicap us".

Meanwhile, doctors of Kasturba Hospital in Delhi have also threatened to go on strike due to non-payment of salaries. The doctors are reportedly planning  mass resignations.

According to the letter to Medical Superintendent of Kasturba Hospital by the RDA on Tuesday, the doctors are planning to go on a total strike from October 14 due to non-payment of salaries since July.

“The doctors are going on total strike from tomorrow onwards due to the nonpayment of resident doctors’ salaries since July. Also we like to inform that we will be on strike for next 7 days from 14-10-2020 to 20-10-2020 or till our salaries will be credited after 20-10-2020,” reads the letter.

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