Bending the rules: YDA threatens to stage sit-in if colleagues repatriated

30 doctors on deputation refuse to go back to their parent departments.

ISLAMABAD:

A tug of war over senior posts at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) has begun between its administration and members of the Young Doctors Association (YDA).

After the issuance of notifications from Pims for the repatriation of doctors to their parent departments, the YDA has given a three-day ultimatum to the institute’s administration to take back the decision. Failure to do so will result in a sit-in outside the main administration block of Pims on Monday, they warned.

Talking to The Express Tribune, members of YDA said that over 30 doctors from across the country were appointed on deputation in Pims for the last five to six years. Some of them have completed their training and others are nearing completion, after which they should be eligible for appointments to senior posts at the hospital, they said.

“This has scared some of the Pims officials, who either want those appointments for themselves or for their own people, who don’t even qualify for the posts. So they are going all-out to get rid of these doctors appointed on deputation, by sending them back to their parent institutes,” said Dr Ghulam Shabir, medical officer (MO) at the Plastic Surgery department and a member of YDA.

He said that recently, the Pims administration issued a notification in which they asked Dr Niaz Baloch, currently serving as MO at the gastroenterology department, to go back to his parent department, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), Karachi.

“We strongly condemn and straightaway refuse to accept all such notifications. It is our right to work where we have been posted and get what we deserve,” he said.

Meanwhile, sharing his side of the narrative, a senior administration official at Pims requesting anonymity, said doctors, who were appointed on deputation, are trying to blackmail the Pims administration into hiring them.

“The reason for this is that they want to stay in Islamabad and are looking forward to be employed at the Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto Medical University (Pims),” said the official.

As they were appointed on deputation, they are not employees of Pims and therefore, have to go back, said the official.

When Shaheed Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto Medical University (Pims) Vice Chancellor Prof. Javed Akram was contacted, he said that he had asked all the doctors on deputation to bring their individual cases to him, so that he could go through them.

“There is already an acute shortage of staff at Pims, therefore we will have to accommodate a majority of them either at the hospital or at the university, so that patients are attended to,” he said.

Prof. Akram said that he has asked them to consult with the management of their parent institutes and if they did not have any issue with their continuing to work at Pims, they would be appointed in Pims.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 8^th, 2014.