Chennai: Declaring the strike by nurses as illegal, the Madras high court on Wednesday restrained the Tamil Nadu MRB Nurses Empowerment Association and MRB Nurses Welfare Association from taking recourse to strike.
"Strike called by persons who are engaged in providing essential services calls for stern action. We thus deem it appropriate to declare the strike as illegal. We pass an interim order restraining the Tamil Nadu MRB Nurses Empowerment Association and MRB Nurses Welfare Association from taking recourse to strike", said the First Bench comprising Chief Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice M.Sundar.
Passing interim orders on a petition from N.Ganesh of Avadi, the bench made it clear that any member of these two associations refrain from attending to work or performing duty should do so at his/her risk of consequences thereof including termination of their employment and/or penalisation for gross contempt of court.
Once the members of these two associations resume their work, the state health and family welfare department or its representatives shall immediately start and resume negotiations for immediate improvement of the service conditions and in particular enhancement of remuneration paid to the nurses appointed under a scheme, the bench added.
Posting to January 2 further hearing of the case the bench said status report relating to the outcome of the negotiation should be filed. In his petition, Ganesh sought a direction to the members of the Tamil Nadu MRB Nurses Empowerment Association and MRB Nurses Welfare Association and the contract nurses employed with the government hospitals in the state from resorting to any kind of agitations, strike or refusal to work or abstaining from discharging their duty and obligation attached to their employment.
