When Government takes any decision especially to cater to the emerging needs of a particular department, more so concerning Health and Medical Education Department , it should in its second immediate preference, strive to implement such a decision and that also at an early date. The decision taken by the then State Government way back in 2010 to create as many as 2093 Non-Gazetted posts for smooth functioning of each and every department of Government Medical College and Associated Hospital (GMC&AH), Jammu has yet to see the light of the day. It is evident that after taking into consideration each and every aspect , necessitating of creation of as many posts by the Government should have been taken to the desired and logical ends. Leaving the issue as it is and despite knowing the necessity of implementation of the decision and feeling even the pinch of the issue being kept lingering on, only ad-hoc and patch working arrangements are resorted to by the administrative authorities. Such an approach , we, through these columns, have throughout been opposing on the ground that such measures were not yielding the desired results and performance was becoming the immediate casualty as under temporary and ad-hoc arrangements, responsibility and transparency were in deficit if not missing altogether. Agreed, such a process had to be implemented in consonance with budgetary available cushion and probably, instead of in one go, could be done in a staggered way, which could have resulted into making it possible and likely for each and every unit and department of the GMC&AH fully functional and thus giving out the desired results. After all, it was a cabinet decision of March 2010 followed by a Government order too. However, the extent of casual approach can be gauged by the fact that only in 2017 , say after nearly seven years , the authorities concerned asked the Principal GMC Jammu to furnish draft rules for the proposed new posts to be created. The approach of looking at the issue, in short, has been found that of in piece -meals and in respect of fraction of posts only after the GMC Principal submitted its clarification and set of governing rules . Approval was accorded only to 10 categories and another 10 categories were “approved” a year later say in 2019.Vital departments including in Super Speciality Hospital thus are continuing to remain vacant of the specialists posts ,though being important in nature, due to such an approach by the authorities concerned. Neurology Department , in particular, has become dysfunctional , two doctors serving in the department are on deputation only from Health Department. While two months back, the authorities in GMC and AH Jammu advertised 60 posts under 12 categories like EEG Technicians, Anaesthesia Assistants, Dialysis and Lab Technicians etc but still as on date, these posts too continue to be vacant and not filled. The immediate sufferers are the patients and the performance of the hospital despite with so much of infrastructure but due to faulty administrative policies, continues to remain unsatisfactory requiring virtually an overhaul. Under these circumstances, why should the GMC &Associated Hospital Administration not be given functional autonomy to cater to their personnel needs rather than subject the entire scenario to the whims of bureaucracy that perhaps is oblivious of ground realities and where the concerned management of the hospital knows where the shoe pinches when it has to face precarious situation of dealing with patients with scant or insufficient infrastructure and at times, the ire of their family attendants too. It would be prudent on the part of the administration to clarify and remove the mist of the entire issue and decide about filling up all the 2093 posts of non- gazetted category in totality so that the services and the care about patients in the Associated Hospitals improved considerably
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