Health workers to strike from tomorrow at Gandhinagar Satyagraha Camp

 

Health workers to strike from tomorrow at Gandhinagar Satyagraha Camp

Gandhinagar: Health workers seek regularisation of services, go on indefinite strike

Asha workers, link workers, and arogya sevikas, who are members of the Mahamandal, instead went to Gandhinagar and camped in front of the Sachivalaya to press for their demands.

Demanding regularisation of services and pay hike, workers administering anti-polio vaccine in the state went on an indefinite strike Sunday. These workers, belonging to Health and Family Welfare Department, gathered under the banner of Arogya ane Parivar Kalyan Karmachari Mahamandal (APKKM). They were detained in Gandhinagar and were released later.

Asha workers, link workers, and arogya sevikas, who are members of the Mahamandal, instead went to Gandhinagar and camped in front of the Sachivalaya to press for their demands. APKKM president Akash Sarkar later said these workers were working in pitiable conditions with an abysmally low honorarium for 12 years, but no one in the government has listened to them.

The memorandum stated that these workers have been working under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) since 2004. “This work comes under essential services. Therefore, they can’t be forced to work as contract workers and accordingly, they should be treated as permanent employees,” the memorandum said. Sarkar said the local bodies and state government had been treating them in an unjust manner, which was condemnable. Sarkar said they must be made permanent and also paid salary arrears since 2004. He said that women workers should be given matrimonial benefits. They also demanded that the word “remuneration” be replaced with “salary” henceforth. If the demands are not accepted, over 1.25 lakh workers will stage a demonstration in Gandhinagar, he said.