Maha: Doctors at HBT Trauma Care receive partial dues amidst strike threats

Mumbai: The ongoing threats of doctors' strike over non-payment of salaries at the Hindu Hruday Samrat Balasaheb Thackeray Trauma Care in Jogeshwari have stopped after the doctors received some of their pending dues on Wednesday, March 8. 

A few days back, the doctors had threatened to go on an indefinite strike over the non-payment of salaries since August 2022, following which they received their dues up to December 2022 with the assurance that the remaining amount would be paid within a week. 

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The hospital, which is run by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), was in a tie-up with the Jeevan Jyot Charitable Trust to enable the provision of doctors to run the 30 bedded ICU facilities at the hospital. A number of doctors began working at the hospital when the charitable trust got its tender in 2017.  

One of the doctors, in an earlier report in HT, had said, "We have been verbally and physically following up on the issue with the administration for the last few months. We understand that as per the contract between the corporation and the trust, the trust is supposed to clear our salaries. But they have not. Since we are serving the patients in BMC hospital and informed the authorities about the trust not paying our salary, it is the moral responsibility of the corporation to stop paying the trust and inquire why our salaries have not been paid." 

The doctors had already written a letter to the hospital administration and the BMC additional municipal commissioner Sanjeev Kumar on February 21, warning of going on a strike over unmet demands. One doctor had observed that they were assured of payment by March 4 at the time of writing the letter. 

The doctors have been demanding complete payment of their pending dues and the cancellation of the trust's tender. They had threatened of going on a strike since March 7. However, a doctor observed, "But we were unable to go on a strike because there were patients on the ventilator. We have requested the BMC to hold an inquiry on the Trust for delaying our salaries as we are serving the patients in BMC hospital. The Corporation should stop paying the Trust. This is not the first time that our salary was delayed, but this is the longest period for which we were not paid." 

Meanwhile, a senior health department official stated that they are currently in the process of setting up an inquiry against the charitable trust. 

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