MADURAI: Nearly 30 per cent of government medical college hospitals and institutions in the State do not have biometric attendance system, revealed a report submitted by the State Health Secretary Beela Rajesh before the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court here.
Beela submitted the report in response to a contempt petition filed by C Anand Raj, against the government’s delay in complying with an order passed by the Court on March 5, 2019.
According to the report, out of 400 government hospitals and institutions including medical college hospitals, district and taluk hospitals, hospitals under Indian System of Medicine and Homeopathy, ESI hospitals and offices among others, only around 70 per cent have biometric attendance system as on April 2019.
Moreover, there were no biometric attendance devices in the government hospitals in Sivaganga and Tiruvallur, the report revealed.
All 45 medical college hospitals in the State, except Madurai Medical College, and all the seven hospitals under Indian System of Medicine and Homeopathy have been provided with the biometric system.
Out of 330 medical facilities including headquarters and taluk level hospitals and dispensaries in the State, the system has not been installed in 21 medical facilities. Sources said that the authorities are planning to equip two hospitals with the system soon. The devices are not functioning in 75 hospitals due to various reasons. And there seems to be no plan of installing the device in 30 facilities.
The secretary also submitted that there are 23 biometric attendance devices in stock in the ESI hospitals and offices and none of them are working. “The Additional Commissioner and Regional Director of ESI Corporation in Chennai have requested to install 253 devices in the ESI hospitals, dispensaries and offices,” she said.
The Tamil Nadu Medical Services Corporation Limited has also floated open tender for hiring services of Aadhar enabled biometric devices on February 28, 2019, she further added and sought six months additional time to comply with the order. A bench comprising Justices M Sathyanarayanan and B Pugalendhi who perused the report, adjourned the case to January 21, 2020 for filing additional status report.