Health services under the National Health Mission (NHM), including patient diagnosis and treatment, immunisation, laboratory tests and patient counselling, stayed impacted on Wednesday as almost 8,000 contractual employees went on a statewide strike. As part of their protest, the employees also staged a protest outside the NHM headquarters in Chandigarh.
The striking workforce includes medical officials, community health officials (CHOs), assistant medical officials, staff nurses, auxiliary nurse midwives (ANMs), laboratory technicians and Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK) teams. These employees work at district and subdivisional hospitals, community health centres (CHCs), primary health centres (PHCs) and Ayushman Arogya Kendras.
Dr Sunil Targotra, a senior NHM employees leader, said almost 8,000 workers participated in strike, boycotting their duties. He said following the protest in Chandigarh, a meeting with the Cabinet Sub-Committee had been slated for November 12 to discuss their demands. However, the workers will continue their strike until then.
"If the meeting fails to yield any positive results, we will stage a protest outside the residence of Health Minister Balbir Singh in Patiala," he stated.
The employees are demanding a permanent service policy, regularisation of long-serving staff, a salary hike and implementation of the principle of equal pay for equal work, besides resolution of other service-related issues.
Targotra remarked employees had raised their demands through almost 54 meetings with the government but no concrete solution had emerged. He also alleged that the administration had not held a single meeting of the welfare panel constituted to address their grievances.
