UP: Health Workers in Prayagraj Hospital Not Paid For 6 Months; Union Claims 30,000 'Fired' Post COVID-19

Lucknow: As many as 183 health workers employed on outsourcing basis at Swaroop Rani Nehru Hospital (SRNH) in Prayagraj, have not been paid salary for the past six months, forcing them to go on protest.

The outsourced workers who have been protesting for the past 15 days, said that they were left with no choice because their representation to the hospital authorities did not yield any results. The said that if they are not paid their dues by this month, they may have to stall work or go on a full-fledged strike from next month.

"We have not been paid salaries for the past six months, making it difficult for us to fulfil daily needs,” Varsha Singh, a protesting worker, told NewsClick.

She, along with other protesting employees, said that they were last paid salaries in July last year. Since then, they have been making the rounds of various offices and have only got assurances. 

 "We have been protesting for the last 15 days but not a single officer has bothered to come here to know our plight. We were appointed through an outsourcing company named Jeet Security Services. When we approached the agency for our pending salary, they asked us to knock on the medical college's door. The principal of the medical college asked us to check with the agency. We're being kicked around like a football. Furthermore, we have been forced to work 12 hours on night shifts every month; we get only four holidays in a month and no leave even if there is an emergency in our family," a distraught Singh told NewsClick.

Ankit Sen Yadav, a nursing staff, who is leading the protest, told NewsClick that all 183 nurses employed at the hospital were on strike. Yadav said the nursing staff had written to the chief medical superintendent, district magistrate and principal of the medical college last month and warned of an agitation if salaries were not disbursed.

Their letter sent to the district magistrate last month in December, a copy of which is with NewsClick, read: "With respect, you have to inform that the posts of staff nurse -- both men and women appointed Jeet Security Services on contract basis. Moti Lal Nehru Medical College (MLNMC), under which the Swaroop Rani Nehru Hospital falls where 183 staff nurses were outsourced and 53 staff nurses were hired in April 2021 during COVID-19. We have not received a salary for five months.

"In the interest of patients, we have worked silently with complete devotion to date. It is very difficult to fulfil our daily needs without a salary. We have our financial difficulties and obligations and the situation has now become intolerable," the letter reads further. 

Pointing out ‘violation’ of the government order, Yadav said: "In 2018, the government ordered a mandate that there should be a 10% salary hike every year, but it has not been implemented to date by both the agency and hospital. Instead of increasing the salary, our salary has been reduced from Rs 25,000 per month to Rs 16,200.”

The protesting nursing staff NewsClick spoke with said that they had been working for the past seven-eight years. "Each and every healthcare worker has worked around the clock to provide medical services during the COVID-19 surge, especially during the peak of the second wave in May this year. Now, the health workers have been treating us like 'use and throw'. The COVID warriors must be respected and their contacts should be merged and performing equal work must receive equal pay,” said the protesters.

Another worker alleged that they did not get benefits under the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) and Employee State Insurance (ESI) even after nearly working for a decade. “To date, we have not received our EPF number and when we go to the official of ESI to inquire about any such deduction from our salary, he says no amount deposited in our account."

NewsClick reached out to the hospital’s medical superintendent, who refused to comment.

Meanwhile, health workers of Maharani Laxmi Bai Medical College in Uttar Pradesh's Jhansi have also been protesting for the past few days against the pending salary for five-six months. The protesting medical staff includes nursing, sanitation workers, ward boys, ambulance drivers and others.

Pawan, a protesting worker, told NewsClick: "Every time we are given excuses of budget shortage. We are fed up now. Contract employees working in every department of the medical college are being exploited by not paying salary on time. We have worked risking our lives in the pandemic and now the same officers who used to praise us and call us warriors do not even bother to talk to us."

Outsourced Workers Want 'Equal Pay For Equal Work'

This is not the first such protest by health workers in Uttar Pradesh in recent months. During the pandemic, healthcare workers, ambulance drivers, sanitation workers and ASHA workers have repeatedly gone on strike over non-payment of dues and poor working conditions. Their protests did not receive much attention and were brushed under the carpet by the government authorities as well as the media.

Recently, after not receiving a salary for more than nine months, at least 26 contractual health workers including Data Entry Operators and lab technicians deputed at different community health centres in Basti district, who worked with the Uttar Pradesh government on COVID-19 special duty, threatened mass immolation on November 30. 

They took the extreme decision after knocking on the doors of district administration, National Health Mission (NHM) and the City Livelihood Centre (CLC) through which they were hired during the first wave of COVID-19, but no satisfactory solution had been devised. All 26 employees are posted at different community health centres in Uttar Pradesh's Basti district. 

NewsClick spoke with Ritesh Mall, state president of Sanyukt Swasthya Outsourcing/Samvida Karmchari Sangh to understand the possible reason for the delayed salary of health workers. He said, "Every month the budget is prepared by verifying the attendance of workers, which is sent to the medical department, it sends it to the government, then the salary comes. The budget that is made every month, in the end, gets delayed either by the agency or the medical health department. The clerk at the government office did the rest of the work to get more delayed. However, the administrative officers of the Medical Health department always say that the budget has not been released by the government."

However, the union president alleged that the "workers under medical education department receive their salary two to three months late but outsourced workers deputed at CHCs, PHCs, district hospitals, 100 wing hospitals, 100-bed trauma centres- all come under medical education department and get salary six-eight months late."

There are more than one lakh outsourced workers, including sanitation workers, para-medical staff and nursing staff, across the state, who come under the medical education department. They have been facing financial difficulties due to the delayed salary system, said Singh. 

Not long back, around 80,000 employees outsourced through XEAM Venture, Mishra Security, Principal Security, Jeet Security and Avani Paridhi and working at King George’s Medical University (KGMU), Ram Manohar Lohia Institute of Medical Sciences (RML), Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGI), state-level government hospitals and autonomous hospitals in UP alleged that they had not been paid salaries in the past few months.

Read Also: 80,000 Outsourced Health Employees in UP Not Paid For Months | NewsClick

"If any private agency does not make any payment within seven days, then a 10% penalty has to be paid along with salary, as per the recommendation of the government but despite this, the workers are not paid even after eight-nine months," the Outsourced Employees Union told NewsClick. 

The union further claimed that the health system of the entire state was running with the help of outsourced workers. During the first wave of COVID-19, around 40,000 health workers were hired on an outsourcing basis and given an extended period of one year, but more than 30,000 have been fired so far out of which most of them ever receiving full salary, the union alleged.

Two years ago, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had promised to give 25% as 'protsahan rashi' (incentive) to frontline workers but they did have not got a single penny so far, alleged Mall.