Executive director’s transfer: Patients suffer as doctors boycott OPDs at Polyclinic

Staff goes on strike after Dr Raja Amjad Mahmood transferred to PIMS

ISLAMABAD: Patients visiting Polyclinic Hospital faced immense problems on Thursday as doctors boycotted the outpatient departments (OPDs) in protest against the transfer of the Executive Director Raja Amjad Mahmood.

The Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD) had issued the transfer order a day earlier, replacing him with Dr Iftikhar Ahmed Naroo as new executive director of the hospital.

Senior as well as junior doctors under the banner of the Young Doctors’ Association, members of the joint action committee, paramedical staff and nurses passed a resolution demanding rescinding of  Mahmood’s transfer order.

Mahmood was transferred to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) at a time when the CADD Minister, Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, was in Saudi Arabia to perform Umra.

The minister had appointed Dr Mahmood as executive director of the hospital two months ago.



Young doctors and joint action committee members at the Polyclinic Hospital announced that they would boycott the OPDs from 9am to 11am daily till Eid and they would continue their protest until the hospital gets back Mahmood.

“The protest started today and the OPDs remained closed for the whole day and the next protest plan will be decided after the Eid holidays,” Young Doctors’ Association President Dr Sartaj Ali said, while talking to The Express Tribune.

He claimed that what Dr Mahmood delivered in the last two months could not be done in the last 20 years.

Dr Ali said that when they contacted Chaudhry in Saudi Arabia, he expressed his ignorance about the decision.

Sources at the CADD and Polyclinic Hospital claimed that corrupt elements were feeling uneasy in going along with Dr Mahmood, who had not only launched several initiatives including uplift projects for the hospital in a short span of time but had also cancelled some shoddy contracts of the hospital.

Recently, Dr Mahmood cancelled a contract of supply of medical gases and other accessories to the hospital at exorbitant rates. The contractor took stay from a court.

Dr Mahmood also introduced biometric system at the hospital to ensure attendance of the staff and doctors, renovated and upgraded Thallium and Nuclear Diagnostic Department (TNDD), besides computerising stocks and inventories.

“Due to the upgradation of the thallium department all scans are being carried out at the hospital free-of-cost,” Kamran Khan, a technician at the TNDD said. He said that earlier the patients were referred to the NORI or other hospitals for tests.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 1^st, 2016.