Over 10,000 govt doctors in Rajasthan submit resignation demanding pay hikes, housing facilities

Jaipur: Hundreds of government doctors on Sunday gathered in Jaipur to submit their resignation to the All Rajasthan In Service Doctors Association (ARISDA) in support of their 33 long-pending demands. The demands include formation of a separate cadre for in-service doctors, Rs 10,000 grade pay benefit to doctors, rectification in salary discrepancy, housing facility and safety for all doctors, said Dr Ajay Chaudhary, president ARISDA. They are also demanding for running government health centres in a single shift and rural allowance, he said. [caption id=“attachment_4175423” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. PTI[/caption] There are 10,000 doctors who are protesting for the demands to be fulfilled. He also said that if the government does not fulfill their demands, the resignations will be effective from 6 November. According to The Times of India report, the doctors are not cooperating with the health department in other routine works including sending reports to the health directorate of national health programmes. However, they are regularly going to hospitals to see the patients. On 22 October a meeting of ARISDA was organised in which doctors alleged the state government was not taking any action on their 33 demands pending for a long time. In September, the doctors had gone on a one-day mass leave to press for their long-pending demands, prompting the government to invoke the Rajasthan Essential Services Maintenance Act (RESMA) for three months, NDTV had reported. Rajasthan Health Minister Kalicharan Saraf had assured the doctors that the government was working to address their issues and appealed them to resume their works. With inputs from PTI