As many as 868 junior doctors in Kerala are planning for a ‘mass resignation’ over the non-payment or partial payment of salaries over the past four months. The COVID-19 frontline workers, who are MBBS graduates from government-run medical colleges in the state, had joined the fight against the pandemic in May. Since then, they allege that most of them haven’t been paid.
“While 485 doctors haven’t been paid their salary for the past two months, 350 doctors got salaries between Rs 27,000 and Rs 29,000. The promised salary was Rs 42,000. Of those who got the salary, Rs 8,400 was deducted as a part of the government’s ‘salary challenge’ and Rs 4,200 was deducted as tax,” Ousam Hussain KP, state President of Kerala Junior Doctors Association told TNM.
Among the 868 doctors, 500 doctors work in COVID-19 First Line Treatment Centres (CFLTC) and the rest have been assigned COVID-19 related duty at health centres. The government order to hire the doctors came in April and they joined work in May.
The 868 doctors gave a notice on their plan to mass resign to Health Minister KK Shailaja and Director of Health Services RL Saritha on August 28, seeking payment. They are planning to give another notice on September 3.
“We haven’t heard back from the authorities yet. If the salary is not paid or a clear order on this is not issued by September 10, we will go for a mass resignation,” Ousam Hussain said.
In August, 18 junior doctors who were working on COVID-19 related duty had approached the Kerala High Court seeking directions to the government to pay their salaries and arrears immediately.
The petition was filed by Association Secretary TS Krishna Priya. The petition sought orders from the court to ensure that proper salaries, fixed duty time and holidays as granted to other doctors, were implemented for them. TNM had also reported earlier on 1,000 young doctors in the state, who had no clarity on their designation or duty, but were working in several healthcare centres across the state, amid the pandemic.
In a similar incident in July, 40 Kerala doctors who had travelled to Mumbai at the request of the Maharashtra state government, to help the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) in its fight against COVID-19, decided to return home as the civic body did not pay their salaries.