Tirupati: Demanding that the government should immediately release their long pending stipend, the interns working at S.V.R. Ruia government hospital in Tirup-ati boycotted their duties on Tuesday.
The interns pointed out the negligent attitude of the hospital authorities in submitting their attendance and other relevant bills to the concerned department within the stipulated time and therefore the government had put a freeze on the stipend since October 2018. The interns who boycotted their duties staged a protest in front of the hospital and raised slogans against the administration.
Speaking on the occasion, one of the interns, Dr Kranti Kiran said that the interns in other medical colleges were receiving the stipend on time, but due to the negligent attitude of the Ruia hospital authorities, they had not got their stipend.
“Despite several representations, the hospital authorities submitted all the bills on December 22, but the government had reportedly given instructions to the treasuries to freeze all the payments due to the delay in submitting the bills. Without getting stipends, we have been facing severe hardships and as a last resort, we went on strike and boycotted electives on Tuesday,” Dr Kranti Kiran said. Meanwhile, he added that they had been facing severe problems in duty hours with the non-availability of several emergency drugs, glucose strips, blood transfusion sets and other emergency materials.
“In the absence of radio diagnosis, X-ray films and CT video and other services at the emergency block, we were made to run between casualty and diagnostic services to get the reports as part of the treatment. It was causing delay and one small mistake may prove fatal for patients,” he said.
However, the interns have given time to the authorities till Wednesday morning to take immediate steps and resolve their issues within 24 hours. They also threatened to boycott all emergency services from Wednesday if the hospital authorities failed to initiate any action. Dr C. Umesh Chandra, Dr K. Chaitanya, Dr Sravya, Dr Sophiya and several others took part in the agitation.
