The State Programme Manager of the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) and the Additional Director of Health Services (FW), N. Sreedhar, has clarified that the government has no intention of terminating the employment of over 3,500 contract employees of the NRHM, when the first phase of the mission ends on March 31.
“The new mission or the second phase of NRHM commences on April 1. We intend to renew the contracts of the employees. There will be some weeding out on the basis of performance appraisals but we have no intention of sending off all our employees. All NRHM district programme managers (DPMs) have been sent directives to this effect,” Dr. Sridhar said.
ASHAs' dharna
Meanwhile, the Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) in the district have announced that they will be staging a dharna in front of the office of the Thiruvananthapuram DPM, demanding that they be retained and that the honorarium of Rs.500 per month, announced earlier by the government, be paid to them immediately.
Dr. Sreedhar said ASHAs would also be retained but that the payment of honorarium depended on when the funds would be released by the government.
