Nurses Threaten Cease Work As Junior Doctors Call Off 12-Day Strike In Odisha

Bhubaneswar: While junior doctors and interns of state-run medical colleges, including SCB MCH, MKCG MCH, VIMSAR and PGIMER, called off their strike on Friday evening, Odisha Nursing Employees’ Association (ONEA) has threatened to go for cease work agitation on August 27.

The junior doctors, who had been protesting for last 12 days, agreed to rejoin duty following assurance from the Health and Family Welfare department that a comprehensive policy to provide safe working environment for them will soon be put in place.

This was announced after a meeting between the Junior Doctors’ Association (JDA) and commissioner-cum-secretary of the Health and Family Welfare department. The department informed that if the protesting doctors and house surgeons rejoined duty by the end of Saturday, the period from August 15 till date will be treated as duty period.

On the other hand, members of ONEA, who staged protests at Lower PMG Square on Friday, threatened to go on a strike if the state government did not fulfil their 10-point charter of demands – treating the period of their contractual service as a period of qualifying service for consideration of promotion, sanction of modified assured career progression (MACP) and notional increments.

The association is also demanding promotion of eligible nursing officers to the post of senior nursing officer and assistant nursing superintendent by way of relaxation of residency period, recruitment against the post of community health officers under the NHM, reverting the deployed regular nursing officers to their parent cadre and regularisation of left out contractual nursing officers.