Health News / The health workers working in Tilottama municipality have been protesting since they have not been paid for five months. 78 health workers working in 17 health institutions under the municipality protested after not receiving their salaries since January.
Health workers have asked the municipality to arrange for quick salary, saying that it is a problem for them to manage their household expenses if they have not been paid for five months. There are 45 non-commissioned employees and 32 non-commissioned employees who are engaged in adjustment, work and covid work.
They held a press conference at the municipal office on Wednesday and demanded the government to ensure that they get regular salaries. According to the health workers, they submitted a memorandum on behalf of all the health workers on May 1 and requested that all the permanent employees receive their current salary within 7 days and to ensure that they receive their salary regularly in the coming days, but there was no hearing from the municipality.
Gyan Prasad Poudel, coordinator of the Health Workers Sangharsh Samiti, complained that despite repeated verbal and written requests to City Chief Ramakrishna Khan, Deputy Chief Jageshwar Devi Chaudhary and Chief Administrative Officer Narayan Aryal, they were not heard.
Poudel complained that neighboring Butwal sub-metropolitan city, Devdah and other municipalities were paying salaries to health workers from internal sources, while in Tilottama, they showed an irresponsible attitude towards the problems of employees.
Paudel commented that the leadership of the municipality promotes that we have provided health services from all 17 wards, but disregarded the cries and pain of the employees of those health institutions and disrespected the international quality mark.
“The health workers have to look for loans and cover their household expenses, some of the employees’ sons and daughters have not been able to enroll in school” – Paudel said – “Since there is no concrete initiative from the municipality, we have submitted a memorandum to the Prime Minister, the Minister of Health and the members of the House of Representatives of Rupandehi. There is no choice.’
Public Health Inspector Thaneshwar Basyal, a member of the Sangharsh Committee, said that the health workers, who have been working with black bands on their hands since May 8, will hold a sit-in at the municipal office from May 12 to protest against non-payment of salaries.
The chief administrative officer of the municipality, Narayan Aryal, said that salaries could not be paid because there were 33 more employees than the number of posts.
However, the Sangharsh Committee has demanded that 10 health institutions established as per the decision of the city executive and basic city hospitals should create a permanent list of necessary employees and manage the employees.
The Sangharsh Committee has requested the unions, organizations and trade unions active in the professional field to support and show solidarity with their demands. The Sangharsh Committee has also demanded to publicize the details of the people who have received the fuel, travel expenses and communication facilities provided by Tilottama municipality so far and to manage all the employees on the basis of equality and needs from the coming days.
Aryal, the chief administrative officer, said that about 40 million salary days of the health workers are due for five months. He said that there was a problem when the Ministry of Health did not send the salaries of the employees except for the posts.The health workers say that they have nothing to do with the Ministry of Health as they have been adjusted at the local level.
“This problem is not only a problem of Tilottama, but it is a problem of the health workers of municipalities all over the country” – Aryal said – “It is not that there is no initiative from the municipality to pay salaries, but until the federal government makes a policy decision, salaries cannot be paid from here. Health workers all over the country need a budget of 2 billion.”
Due to the incompetence of the leadership of the health branch, despite being ahead in other indices, Tilottma ranks 14th out of 16 municipalities in the district, health workers said.
Sangharsh Samiti allocates at least 10 percent of the overall budget to the health sector to improve the health sector,
restructure posts based on population and wards to make basic health services easily accessible to the people, and complete the construction of the under-construction Anandavan Basic Hospital and BP Gram Basic Hospital under Tilottama Municipality as soon as possible. It has demanded immediate payment of the covid-19 insurance amount to operate the city hospital.
In the same way, medical officers should be provided with higher education study facilities for other employees in the health sector, since technical 2 grades were provided to the employees appointed before 2057,
technical grades should be provided to all technical employees in the health sector in due course. The Struggle Committee has demanded that there should be a system of continuous access to services.
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