Over 3,000 posts vacant in Punjab Health Department

Vishav Bharti

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 27

More than 3,200 regular posts of various categories, including doctors and nurses, have been lying vacant in the Health Department for several years. To put this into perspective, consider this: thousands of unemployed and contractual employees have been protesting for long, demanding regular jobs.

As per a report of the Health Department prepared last year and submitted to the government, 3,218 posts in 27 categories of employees are vacant. These concern doctors, nurses, multipurpose health workers, clerks and pharmacy officers, among others.

The maximum vacant posts are of a doctor. In all, 807 posts are vacant — 494 of specialist doctor and 313 of general physician.

It is followed by 727 posts of female multipurpose health worker, 299 of staff nurse, 264 of computer operator, 254 of clerk, 253 of medical laboratory technician, 82 of male multipurpose health worker and 74 of opthalmic officer.

Besides, several posts of dental hygienist, operation theatre assistant, ECG technician, block extension educator, assistant dietician, statistical assistant, statistical superintendent, pharmacy officer and steno are vacant.

There has been no upturn in the sorry state of affairs despite the fact that Punjab has been witnessing breakout of diseases, including dengue and Covid.

Inderjit Singh Rana, president of the National Health Mission Employees Union, said: “The government hired doctors and other employees on contract, but did not make regular appointments. Successive governments have done injustice to the qualified youth, who did not get a chance to serve in the state. In all these years, a complete generation eligible for these posts has crossed the maximum age limit fixed for a government employment.”

Andesh Kang, Director, Health Services, refused to comment on the matter.

When contacted, Health Minister Om Parkash Soni said that he was in a function and that he would call back, but he didn’t.

Around 10,000 contractual employees are working under the National Health Mission (NHM) in Punjab. They have been on the roads, demanding regular jobs. Last week, the government had started the process of regularising more than 4,000 employees from around 30 categories. These employees have served in the NHM for more than 10 years.