Ludhiana, August 23
A five-member delegation of the PCMS Association led by state president Dr Hardeep Singh presented the case of the doctors for restoring their NPA before a high-power committee constituted by the government at Punjab Bhavan, Chandigarh. The committee assured them that until a final decision on NPA is reached, the doctors will get pay for this month without deducting the allowance.
Disclosing the details of presentation, Dr Balwinder Kumar, general secretary of the local unit of the association, said the delegation stressed that NPA is a part of the basic pay of doctors, according to reports of various pay commissions and as per PCMS service rules. NPA is being considered as basic pay by government for all intents and purposes, including house rent allowance, dearness allowance and retirement benefits etc.
The allowance is being given to doctors for their arduous nature of duties, odd working hours and working under life threatening conditions. The members expressed their concern over the inflated figures presented by the government, to be saved on account of withdrawal of the NPA. “The Government has pegged this at Rs 80 crore per year, while according to us it is not more than Rs 10 crores each year”, he said.
Moreover, the members underlined the fact that human life and health aspects should not be translated into financial figures. Benefits arising out of health programmes are the desired effects of the programme like the reduction in mortality, morbidity and control of birth rate or eradication of many diseases. In measurement of efficiency, attempts must be made to solve the problems encountered, rather to cut the budget allocation, he added.
The delegation strongly pleaded not to link NPA with issue of allowing private practice in any way. The delegation suggested the government to sanction leave of self-employment to the doctors, willing to do private practice, at par with other employees of the Punjab govt. This step will wash away the blot of PCMS doctors seeking for private practice, besides giving opportunity of employment to many un-employed doctors, in place of these doctors.
To check the menace of absenteeism, the association apprised the committee that PCMSA has already submitted a detailed memorandum in April 2003, to the government suggesting ways and means to check absenteeism among doctors and to improve the work culture in the Health Department so that poor people of the state do not suffer. We suggested decentralisation of supervisory network, proper health budget allocation and making the supervisory staff fully accountable for absenteeism and poor work culture, he pointed out.
The delegation was assured by the committee that a favourable decision will be taken before August 25, 2003, as per agreement reached between PCMSA and the government. The PCMSA has suspended its agitation for this specific period in view of the time bound decision of review committee.
