BJP senior leader Bandaru Dattatreya has demanded the government to regularise the services of 5,000 contract employees working under Arogyasri scheme and also sought the government to release `200 crore salary arrears of these employees pending for the past 10 months with immediate effect.
The contract employees working in Gandhi and Osmania Hospitals also did not receive salaries for the past 10 months amounting to Rs 16 crore, he said.
Alleging that the state government is diluting the Arogyasri scheme by delaying the salaries, the BJP leader in a press release here on Saturday said that the employees are slowly moving away in search of alternative work due to non-payment of salaries. He accused the government of discouraging the poor people from coming to government hospitals which indirectly helps private hospitals.
The former Union minister demanded the government to regularise all the employees working with government hospitals.