Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, Apr 26: The Hospital Development Fund (HDF) employees of JLNM Hospital Rainawari today staged a protest against the non-payment of their salaries for last more than one year despite their hard work.
Several such employees working at different hospitals appeared in the Press Enclave wearing masks and surgical body gowns were seen raising slogans against the administration and in favour of their demands.
The employees said that while the world is appreciating and lauding the work of the frontline workers, they have been deprived of even basic salary for last around 14 months now.
“We are the frontline workers and come in direct contact with the COVID patients at the JLNM hospital, but nobody is bothered about us; we are exposed to greater risk there and amid that, we have been today forced, compelled to come here to protest, otherwise we didn’t want that,” said the State President of the HDF Employees.
He said that due to the non-payment of their salaries, their families are suffering. “It is not just that, while we make them suffer, we also expose them to greater risk as we deal with the COVID,” he said.
The employees who are 43 in number said that they met with the concerned in the Health Department and that they were told to wait for three days. The employees also said that while the Government is talking of crores of rupees regarding the overall spending, the ground situation, they said is quite different.
“We will wait till then, but if our demands are not met within 3 days, we will go for a strike at the JLNM hospital,” they said, adding that at the ground situation the HDF employees are suffering for want of salaries despite their hard work.
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