Rs560m released for doctors’ salary

After strong protests by doctors' organisations and boycott of elective services, including OPDs, in hospitals by trainee medical officers, the provincial government finally released Rs560 million in funds to the Post Graduate Medical Institute (PMGI) to pay salaries.

The funds will be issued in the next two days in the hospitals related to PGMI where the trainee medical officers are working. However, trainee doctors will hold protests in front of OPDs in hospitals on Tuesday.

Sources say that meetings were also held with the top officials of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's (K-P) finance department on behalf of the Provincial Doctors Association.

Sources say that Rs600 million were approved by the finance department for the salaries of 6,000 trainee doctors. However, due to the financial crisis, the finance department has released Rs560 million in current month's salaries, they added.

The trainee medical officers staged protests in hospitals across the province for non-payment of salaries and boycotted all elective services due to which the patients coming to the hospital were facing severe difficulties.

The Young Doctors Association also provided full support in the protest of trainee doctors in hospitals.

All the other hospitals of the province, including the three major hospitals of Peshawar, became a political arena due to the protests. The trainee doctors also wore black armbands in protest.

The president of Young Doctors Association, while leading the demonstration in Khyber Teaching Hospital, said that the non-payment of salaries to 6,000 trainee doctors in the province is extremely cruel in this era of inflation.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 16^th, 2023.