Chief Minister holds meet; assurances of wages made
TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: The striking 108 emergency services employees have been given a chance to join back duty, while at the same time it was assured issue of their wages would be sorted out as decided at a meeting presided over by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar and attended by Health Minister Laxmikant Parsekar and other top heath officials.
The meeting was called between representatives of the strikers, the government and the management of EMRI.
However, it was decided that if there was no response from the EMRI employees than the health department was to be contacted and procedures followed.
Some 14 members of the 108 services, the advanced paramedics, have been on strike for the past couple of days alleging that they had not been paid salaries. However, according to management the workers were not following the new roster system as well as not honouring postings due to which one of the neo-natal ambulances – EMRI has two of these – was forced to stop plying from February.
The striking workers were part of the neo-natal services as well in emergency in PHCs such as Canacona. When company officials were contacted they said that the staff was neither following the roster system nor were going to the places where they were posted. As the attendance sheets were not signed, the salaries could not be paid.
