Over 3000 doctors in Haryana go on strike over pending unmet demands

Ambala: Around 3000 government doctors began a state-wide protest in Haryana on Tuesday for their pending demands. The doctors under the Haryana Civil Medical Services Association are participating in the protest which has subsequently resulted in the shutting down the out-patient departments (OPDs) services at all government hospitals.

According to state president Dr Jasbir Singh Parmar, all medical services, including Covid and emergency duties would be shut down on January 14. 

Also Read:TN Govt Doctors demand Rs 1 crore relief for doctors who died of COVID, Threaten to go on protest on January 19

The Haryana Civil Medical Services Association (HCMSA) were initially scheduled to meet the senior officials of the state government on Monday, but they could not and hence decided to ahead with the strike. 

The state president said, "We were called to meet additional chief secretary (ACS), finance, TVSN Prasad on behalf of the government. However, the officer was suffering from high fever and the meeting got cancelled. Later, the state executive body resolved that the HCMS doctors will be on mass casual leave throughout Haryana."

As per a media report in the Hindustan Times, the major pending demands of the health professionals are hiring of specialist doctors, stopping direct recruitment of senior medical officers and revision of the postgraduate policy. 

They had presented a memorandum to the chief minister on Saturday, where they had stated, "This is causing great resentment in the cadre. The doctors are being forced to go on the path of agitation. Earlier, on November 9, doctors wore black badges and on November 12, a token pen down strike for two hours was observed throughout the state."

The vice president of HCMS Association said, "We had a meeting with director general health services yesterday (Friday) to discuss our demands. The meeting was cordial. Later, another meeting was held with ACS (additional chief secretary), health. In that meeting, our demands were not paid heed to… The behaviour of the state officials in the meeting was humiliating and unacceptable."

The doctors had earlier decided to observe a strike on the same issue on December 13, but had postponed it after holding a meeting with the health minister Anil Vij, who had assured them that all their issues would be resolved. However, the demands of the doctors remained unmet till December 31 as assured by the minister. The Medical Dialogues team had earlier reported about this decision of the HCMSA to postpone their strike after the assurance received by the health minister.

Also Read: Haryana doctors defer strike after Health Minister assurance

Dr. Parmar added that due to this, the doctors are bound to go on a strike against the "insensitive" government. He noted, "In a recent meeting with state officers last week, we were assured again that our demands will be met and asked to cancel the strike considering the pandemic. Later, our core-committee meeting was held and we decided that as there is no seriousness shown towards our demands. We are not willing to bother the public and if there is any untoward incident, the government will be responsible for it." 

He observed that the doctors do not wont to bother the public amid the pandemic but are bound to go on a strike, adding that the government is responsible if any hassles are reported, reports the Hindustan Times.

The chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar on Friday said that he had hoped the doctors would not go on a strike and had told the reporters, "Health Minister has chaired a meeting with them and I think the solution will be out very soon." 

Rajeev Arora, additional chief secretary, health and family welfare, Haryana, had chaired a association members on Friday and had informed them that they were already working to meet two of their demands. He said, "The association has made three demands. We are already working on the demand for creation of a specialist cadre. In the past 6-8 months, I prepared a concept note and submitted it to the government. It was then put up on the website for a month to take inputs from all quarters in October. We are compiling the comments and are in the final stages of the proposal. The PG policy revision is a continuous process. It has been revised twice under my tenure and I have again taken the initiative to revise the policy. The draft has been prepared and it will be submitted to the health minister and CM in the next ten days. We are working on these demands on our initiative solely. I fail to understand how these are the reasons to go on a strike." He added that they were stuck on the third demand, reports the Indian Express.

Arora added, "It is not the first time the SMO recruitment is taking place and this kind of dispensation (direct recruitment and promotion quota) exists in all the services. It has been there from times immemorial. The main sticking point of the meeting was regarding stopping of SMO recruitment. Going on a strike over this issue is blackmailing and they are trying to browbeat others. The Health Minister (Anil Vij) has given them time to meet on December 14 and we are also discussing the matter with the association."