Contract employees working under the National Health Mission staged a protest at the Collectorate in Karimnagar on Wednesday. They played Bathukamma to demand that their issues be addressed. The protest was organized by AITUC. The leaders spoke about how the government has ignored the problems faced by contract employees for the past 20 years, even though they have worked tirelessly during the Corona period.
The issues of contract and outsourcing paramedical employees working in UPHC and UCHC under the National Health Mission have been brought to the government’s attention for a long time, but no action has been taken. There are about 17,000 employees working in NHM, and most of them are not being paid salaries according to the state government’s norms. Some categories of employees are paid less than the permanent employees, while the remaining 7,000 employees are paid very low wages.
The protesters demanded that minimum wage, DA, HIRA, and other allowances be implemented for all employees. They also emphasized that the basic and allowances of permanent employees should be decided according to their cadre for all contract employees working in urban health centers. They referenced a Supreme Court judgment that calls for equal pay for equal work, and urged that it be enforced.
The protesters also demanded that all 17,000 NHM employees be made permanent and that basic salary, DA, HRA, and other allowances be decided for cadres where GO no 510 is not implemented. The program was attended by several individuals including Sagar, Srikanth, Sarita, Prasad, Prashanth, Moga, Santhosh, Archana, Kamaruddin, Anjali, Nandini, Suguna, Lakshmi, Sujatha, and Sravanti.
