With Government nurses across the country going ahead with their strike on Thursday, the Union Health Ministry said that while most of their demands have been met, the ball lies in the court of Finance Ministry as far as their demand on pay scale revision and upward revision in a range of allowances is concerned.
Union Health Secretary CK Mishra said, “the nurses had nine demands. We have agreed to seven and have even communicated this to them. They had agreed to call off the strike last time. We had told them that the remaining two--pay scale revision and allowance revision--do not fall under our purview.
“These are related to the Finance Ministry and are part of the Central Pay Commission's recommendations. We had already forwarded these two demands to the Finance Ministry to look into them.”
He said that their strike has paralyzed the health services particularly for poor patients, who are already reeling under vector-borne diseases and other health issues. The All India Government Nurses Federation had given a call for strike on September 1, unless nine of their demands, including some which did not fall in the Health Ministry's domain, were met.
“With regard to the implementation of the 7th Pay Commission recommendations, only provisional pay fixation has been done for nurses whereas employees in all other sections will enjoy the new salary scale,” Secretary General AIGNF GK Khurana, said.
She said that nurses working in Government hospitals in India receive very less salary and have a huge work load, as compared to nurses working abroad.
The number of nurses on strike is estimated at 70,000.
The nursing unions of all major hospitals across the country, including lok Nayak Jai Prakash Hospital, Govind Ballabh Pant Hospital, Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital, Municipal Corporation of Delhi Hospitals, New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) Hospitals, lady Hardinge Medical College, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, PGI-Chandigarh, Sanjay Gandhi PGI-lucknow, Sawai Mansingh Hospital-Jaipur, Uttar Pradesh Rajkiya Nurses Sangh, Jawaharlal Nehru Post Graduate Institute (JIPMER)-Pudduchery are taking part in the agitation.