Labour Dept failed to reimburse pending claims of ESI insured workers: BBIA

Excelsior Correspondent

JAMMU, Dec 20: A meeting of Bari Brahmana Industries Association was held under the chairmanship of Lalit Mahajan, president of BBIA to discuss the issue of reimbursement claims for the purchase of medicines by industrial workers registered with ESIC.
The meet said that as per the data available with the Association, claims for the reimbursement amounting to Rs 2 crores are pending with the J&K Labour Department since long due to cumbersome procedure resulting the poor industrial workers are running from pillar to post for getting their hard earned money spent on purchase of medicine due to non availability of the same with the State run dispensaries. The Labour Department has failed to purchase the requisite medicines in spite of the huge amount available with the Department duly disbursed by ESI Corporation under the scheme.
The Association said that it is the responsibility of the ESI Hospital/ State run dispensaries to ensure the availability of requisite medicine prescribed by the concerned Doctors and in case of non availability, the claims should be settled immediately on the production of purchase bills by the industrial workers. Further, BBIA said, the Regional Director, ESI Corporation, Jammu should take up the matter with the Medical Superintendent, ESIC Hospital, Bari Brahmana to ensure that the Medicines to be prescribed by the concerned Doctors should be available in the hospital & in case of non availability of the same, the claims should be settled immediately on the production of purchase bills.
” We request Saurabh Bhagat, Commissioner/Secretary Labour & Employment Department, A R War, Labour Commissioner and Regional Director, ESI Corporation, Jammu to kindly intervene in to the matter for the immediate release of pending payments for the reimbursement of pending claims of industrial workers to ensure that the claim should be settled at dispensary level by designating the financial power to the concern Medical Officers of the dispensaries,” the Association said.
The meeting was attended Tarun Singla (Sr Vice President), Ajay Langer (Vice President), Viraaj Malhotra (General Secretary), Rajesh Jain (Secretary) and Vivek Singhal (Treasurer BBIA) and other members.