Given the flooding inside the wards of the Osmania General Hospital (OGH) and the ongoing strike at the Gandhi Hospital, top BJP leaders visited both State-run facilities treating COVID-19 patients to highlight the manpower and infrastructure deficiencies.
BJP city president and MLC N. Ramchander Rao went to Gandhi Hospital to listen to the grievances of the striking employees like staff nurses and others seeking hike in their monthly pay on par with the newly recruited staff for the hospital.
Expressing his solidarity with their cause, Mr. Rao criticised the government for turning a blind eye to the problems associated with the public health hospitals, the only succour for the poor.
The contract nursing staff claimed that they were being paid just ₹17,000 a month despite being working for the last 15 years without any sign of regularisation whereas the newly recruited nurses were being paid about ₹25,000 a month. The patients’ attendants stated that they were being paid ₹7,500 a month only despite putting in long hours of work after the pandemic broke out.
“These healthcare workers are putting their lives at stake, working round the clock in taking care of COVID-19 patients but the government’s apathy and dereliction is clear in not listening to their woes and forcing them to come out to strike. The situation is explosive yet the focus of the ruling class is on demolition of Secretariat which is a big waste of money,” he alleged.
The MLC demanded the government to concede to the workers’ demands and improve facilities in the public health hospitals. A day earlier, lone BJP MLA Raja Singh had visited OGH where rain water had seeped into the patients’ wards with the drains overflowing and flooding the entire ground floor of the heritage block which has forced patients to sit up on their beds.
The situation worsened on Wednesday and Mr. Singh urged Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao and Health Minister Eatala Rajender to consider the patients plight in OGH. The party has also decided to send another delegation with former president K. Laxman, general secretary G. Premander Reddy, MLA Mr. Singh and MLC Mr Rao visiting both hospitals again to put pressure on the government to act on Thursday.
