The employees announced a strike due to non-payment of two months salary and Diwali bonus
Just a day before Diwali, when all the hospitals are gearing up to take care of the annually increased rush in their Emergency Departments due to burn injuries, the lifeline of Delhi's health care — CATS ambulances — did not run for the entire day on Wednesday, after the employees announced a strike due to non-payment of two months salary and Diwali bonus.
This is the third time this year that the Ambulances staff has gone on strike due to an ongoing issue with the management. The earlier strikes, including an announcement of an indefinite strike in August, were called off every time due to city patients getting affected.
"How do they expect us to celebrate Diwali when we have not received any salaries since last two months? Leave aside bonus, we do not even have money to do Diwali shopping," says an agitated Anil Chhatri, Pilot, CATS ambulance.
This halt came at a time when the Directorate Generally Health Services, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, and DDMA (District Disaster Management Authority), have issued an order asking hospitals to make necessary arrangements to tend to the medical exigency and treatment of patients during Deepavali festival from 9 AM date October 19 to 9 AM on October 21.
After the day-long strike and patients suffering due to unavailability of ambulances, the management finally disbursed the salaries later on Wednesday evening to call off the strike, but only one months' salary was given without any bonus.
102 CATS ambulances service helps over 8,000 patients every day in the city, in two different shifts. The contract for these ambulances is currently with a private company called BVG. The CATS staff union has highlighted several problems in the last one year since the private company took over including no sirens in many ambulances, no air conditioning, no safety kits, etc.
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