The newly-constituted core committee of the Bihar Health Services Association (BHSA), a forum of government doctors from the level of additional primary health centre to the district hospital cautioned the state government that it would take stern measures if the latter did not consider its demands to improve the working condition of medical practitioners, said additional secretary Dr Hasrat Abbas.
He said the committee will seek time to meet health minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav, also the state’s deputy chief minister, and additional chief secretary (health) Pratyaya Amrit, within a week to discuss the problems of doctors at their workplace.
The BHSA’s demands include security of doctors at workplace, allotting them home posting, fixing their duty hours, filling up vacant posts, and implementing the revised grade pay of specialist doctors, he said.
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The BHSA has been requesting the state health department to fix the working hours of doctors, as it claimed that doctors had to work for over two days at a stretch, given the acute scarcity.
The doctors contend that they are already understaffed and managing their duty through mutual arrangement with their colleagues.
With the biometric attendance system, they will not have the flexibility to mutually alter and adjust their working hours.
“There are only around 6,000 doctors against 13,800 sanctioned posts. At times, doctors even have to work for more than 48 hours at a stretch. We are not averse to the biometric attendance, but we want the government to fix our duty timing and programme the system to account for evening and night shifts of doctors as well,” said Dr Ranjeet Kumar, general secretary of the BHSA.
“We also want the government to fill up all vacancies of medical practitioners, and strengthen the health directorate and create more posts of director-in-chief and below, as recommended by a government high-power committee,” he added.
The health department, however, was firm on the biometric attendance system for doctors after chief minister Nitish Kumar ratified its decision in this regard.
Earlier, members of the BHSA wore black badge to work between September 29 and October 5 as a mark of protest against the biometric attendance system. They also boycotted outdoor patient duty (OPD) on October 6.
The doctors were also agitated that despite the government’s approval in 2014, specialist doctors, holding postgraduate degrees, were not getting the approved grade pay of ₹6,600 per month and instead continue to draw ₹5,400, the same as general duty medical officers, who are MBBS degree holders.
“We want the government to identify the culprit in its system who has withheld implementation of the government’s decision for so long,” said Dr Kumar.
The BHSA is also demanding security for doctors at the workplace.
“On an average, around 15-20 doctors are manhandled every month. We want the government to provide adequate security to us at our workplace,” said Dr Kumar.
The BHSA has been trying to meet the health minister since September, but to no avail. “We will send him (Tejashwi Yadav) a fresh request, seeking time to discuss and work out an amicable solution to all our grievances,” he added.