Islamabad, October 06, 2021 (PPI-OT): Minister for Information and Planning and Development Gilgit Baltistan on Wednesday said increased political interference by Sindh Government is ruining the leading hospitals of the country. After playing havoc with the top revenue-generating city of Karachi, the Sindh Government is after Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) for political gains which will be not allowed, he said.
Talking to Dr. Murtaza Mughal, President of Pakistan Economy Watch, Fateh Ullah Khan said that we will go to any extent to safeguard the rights of masses and doctors of Gilgit-Baltistan and other underdeveloped areas. He said that provincial authorities are conspiring against doctors and postgraduate students hailing from Gilgit-Baltistan, AJK, erstwhile Fata and Pata and Balochistan but no one can stop people of these areas from getting jobs and training in JPMC.
Khan, who is who is also Secretary-General Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Gilgit-Baltistan, said that JPMC was among very few state-run hospitals which used to attract donations from the masses due to its quality of service but now political interference has tarnished its image and services which is also hitting the confidence of the masses.
The provincial government has shaken the foundations of this hospital and an independent audit will reveal unbelievable corruption, nepotism, malpractices, and mismanagement, he said. There is rampant corruption in the JPMC and allied facilities and steps should be taken to improve transparency and bring to book doctors with political backing who have engaged in corrupt practices for years with no action taken against them, he observed.
At the occasion, Dr. Murtaza Mughal said that doctors in JPMC have had their promotions withheld for the past 10 years. At least 61 medical officers of the hospital await promotions to the next grade as assistant and associate professors. At present, 30 posts of Grade-18 assistant professors, seven of Grade-19 associate professors and several posts of Grade-20 professors are reportedly lying vacant at the JPMC.
The administrative control of JPMC was transferred from the federal government to the Sindh government in June 2011 after the passage of the 18th Amendment. The hospital employees had appealed the decision at the Supreme Court (SC) against this decision and till July 2016 a stay was in place on the directives of the Sindh High Court (SHC).
Then in 2016 the SHC ruled that the administrative control of three hospitals – JPMC, National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases and the National Institute of Child Health – be handed over to the federal government but in appeal before the apex court, the Sindh government challenged this decision.
The top court granted a stay on the implementation of SHC’s decision and that was in place for another two and a half years. Then in January 2019, the apex court upheld the SHC’s decision and directed the Sindh government to return the three hospitals to federal control within 90 days. But, even after two and a half years of this decision, the management of the three hospitals remains with the Sindh government. During these 10 years, hundreds of employees have retired in all the three hospitals and their posts have been left vacant.
Doctors were last promoted in 2010, when the hospital was still under federal jurisdiction, he lamented. Dr. Mughal said that the Sindh government should immediately fill the vacancies of associate professors and assistant professors by giving promotions to the doctors of the teaching faculty.
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