Government nurses who are employed on a contract basis resumed duty at public healthcare centres across 32 districts across the State on Sunday, after holding a protest in front of Memorial Hall in the city on Saturday. Over 600 nurses had participated in the protest.
At 2 p.m. on Saturday, representatives of the Tamil Nadu Medical Workers' Federation (TNMWF) had gone to submit a petition with their demands to principal secretary of the health department, Girija Vaidyanathan, as well as to Paran Jothi, Director of Medical Services (DMS). According to G. R. Ravindranath, president of TNMWF, the principal secretary was not available and the DMS asked the representatives to meet him two days later. The petition highlights demands such as ensuring nurses hired on a contract basis be made permanent employees, and employing more nurses for each of the PHCs in the rural areas of the State.
According to a government official however, “The nurses are appointed on a contract which states that they will require a minimum of two years of working at a PHC before they can be made permanent. But due to the growing numbers of contract nurses being hired every year, there aren't as many vacancies. Thus it is taking perhaps three or four years for the nurses to become permanent.”
Dr. Ravindranath, on the other hand, said that he was against the whole idea of contract nurses in the first place. “The government is not regulating the services at these health care centres. The contract hiring system is against the rights of the employees. They should all be hired on a regular basis,” he said.
In the event of no response from the health department, on June 25 and 26, more then 6,000 nurses, employed by the government on a contract basis, will each send a telegram to chief Minister J. Jayalalitha, to bring their demands to her attention.
On July 14, TNMWF has made arrangements to conduct a conference focusing on their demands in Tiruchy, where a third of the total population of government contract nurses are expected to attend along with political and trade union leaders.
