Almost 40 pc sanctioned posts lying vacant
Nishikant Khajuria
JAMMU, Nov 24: Because of depleting human resources, major specialties have virtually collapsed in Government Medical College (GMC) Jammu, which is the premier institution catering to the patients from whole of Jammu region.
Official sources told the Excelsior that from amongst 405 sanctioned posts of faculty at different levels in GMC Jammu, almost 40 percent are still vacant and quite a good number of regular faculty members of major specialties are on adhoc senior positions in spite of availability of the vacancies.
Only one DPC for GMC Jammu was conducted in last three years leading to enhanced adhocism in sharp contrast to GMC Srinagar, sources added.
The worst affected GMC Jammu departments due to alleged lackluster approach of Administrative Department are Ortho, Gynecology, Medicine, Surgery, Microbiology, PSM etc.
Ever busy and overburdened Gynecology Department shall be left with only one Professor after December while Orthopedics is having two Professors only and no regular Associate and Assistant Professor, sources informed.
Similarly, sources added, Surgery Department is running without any HoD and having no regular Professor. It has 17 faculty members against the sanctioned posts of 29.
Pertinently, HoD CTVS was given charge of officiating HoD Surgery against rules in April 2021 after the retirement of then Technical Secretary & HoD Surgery Dr Nasib Chand. The same doctor is holding three charges at a time including one as Principal GMC Doda and thus present nowhere due to physical incapacity, sources said.
Another big and very important department of Medicine is having 15 faculty members against sanctioned 29 posts and is having only one Regular Professor who is going to attain age of superannuation next year.
Pertinently, Medicine along with Chest Disease and Anesthesia are the main departments involved in COVID care.
It may be recalled that about a year back, the Division Bench of J&K High Court while hearing two PILs seeking improvement in medical facilities and infrastructure in JK UT, had framed a committee taking experts from PGIMER Chandigarh, Retired doctors from Jammu/Srinagar, and Principals of Jammu/ Srinagar GMCs to examine infrastructure, machinery and human resources in the hospitals and directed that wherever improvement was required, recommendations should be made for the same.
The high-powered committee after visiting almost all major healthcare institutions submitted the report to the concerned quarters. But question of implementation of the report even after directions of High Court is directly linked with intent of bureaucracy to do so and that is not much encouraging at present, sources said.
The Government also had daunting tasks of operationalizing peripheral GMCs, revamping existing postgraduate institutions, building healthcare infrastructure and human resources for both Health & Medical Education Sector vis a vis inculcating an added desire amongst healthcare professionals to work with more and more dedication and zeal.
Unfortunately, due to the non-decisive and non-proactive attitude of administrators at the helm of affairs, it remained an utter failure. Management of two COVID waves in J&K is most glaring wherein, more than 400 patients lost their lives in premier GMC Jammu in May this year creating sharp dents in the image of GMC Jammu and the healthcare and medical education totally collapsed.
“In speeding up the bus for new GMCs, the H&ME Department has punctured the bus of GMC Jammu. Majority of the decisions and policies of the Administrative Department proved to be failure including hastily started peripheral GMCs especially in Jammu division. Shifting of faculty from GMC Jammu to these peripheral Medical Colleges especially at the level of Principal caused a great loss to premier GMC Jammu,” rued a senior doctor on the condition of anonymity.
Even this arrangement did not help to these new institutions and it has also been learnt that adhoc arrangements even at the level of HoDs in majority departments as well as Principal’s chair are prevailing in gross violation of rules, sources said.
“We are expecting collapse even before full establishment of these institutions. Situation of AIIMS Vijapur is also not good as like first batch of MBBS, second batch may not start at Vijapur itself, and if starts in GMC Jammu, it shall burden already overburdened GMC,” opined another senior doctor.
When contacted, Principal GMC Jammu, Dr Shashi Soodan admitted the faculty deficit and consequent difficulties being faced in patient care. However, she informed, the process has already been initiated to engage 20 senior faculty members on academic arrangement and the selection list is likely to be released after completion of necessary formalities like CID verification etc.
“Besides recently conducting DPC of 58 faculty members, 196 posts of Lecturers have been referred to the Government and we are hopeful that with the completion of these processes, the issue of faculty deficit will be addressed to a large extent,” she added..
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