No place to go: PDA demands LRH staff be given proper living quarters

Threaten to protest if accommodation committee not dissolved.

PESHAWAR: The Provincial Doctors Association (PDA) on Wednesday asked the government to provide those doctors, who were currently staying in private rooms or hostels, with adequate living accommodation.

Addressing a news conference at Peshawar Press Club, PDA General Secretary Dr Javed Iqbal said a large number of doctors, serving at Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar, do not have a proper place to live. He blamed LRH’s administration for its negligence in this regard, adding that renting private hotel rooms and residential flats in Khyber Bazaar as well as Qissa Khwani in Peshawar, were putting hospital staff at risk due to security and other factors.

Chief Executive of LRH, Muzaffar Din Sadiq, had put together an accommodation committee under his supervision, which Iqbal claimed was formed on political grounds and its members were biased.

Iqbal mentioned a recent incident regarding the mistreatment of hospital staff as grounds to dissolve the accommodation committee. Iqbal accused the committee of misusing its power when it authorized the search of a room where Dr Lubna, a Senior Registrar at LRH, was residing. He said her room was broken into, which was a violation of their colleague’s privacy. Dr Lubna works in the Cardiology ward, and PDA felt that it is her right to have proper accommodation in LRH’s hostel. The committee, however, had ordered a sweep on doctors residing illegally. “The committee took an extreme step, which is strongly deplorable,” he said.

The organisation demanded the provincial government immediately dissolve the accommodation committee and form a new body comprising members of the hospital’s teaching staff. They also demanded that the government make an official inquiry into Dr Lubna’s incident and take stern action against those involved.

If their demands were not met within a week, PDA threatened  more protests would follow.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 10^th, 2014.