KARUR: Contract labourers at Karur Government Medical College Hospital (GMCH) staged a protest on Tuesday inside the hospital campus as they have not been paid for the last two months.The GMCH in Gandhigramam was inaugurated on March 5 by the Chief Minister.
COVID-19 patients from Karur, Namakkal and Dindigul districts are undergoing treatment in the special isolation ward of the hospital. Around 260 contract labourers at the hospital have been working under Padmavathy Hospitality and Facilities Management Services Company for the past four years. As their contracts expired last month, Crystal Integrated Service Company took up the responsibility and has been running the services.
The contact labourers have not been paid for the last two months, jeopardising their livelihoods. With not much options left, the contract labourers staged the protest and boycotted work. However, they took care to maintain social distancing as they protested.
A labourer told TNIE, “Despite not being paid, we have been working round the clock owing to the COVID-19 situation. But we could not bear it anymore and a strike was our only option. Apart from salary issues, doctors and healthcare officials appear to be prejudiced against us, even with the food we are given. While they eat good food brought from hotels, we are provided with half-cooked food.
Moreover, the sanitation workers are being forced to enter the COVID isolation wards without proper protective gear. Despite working hard and in a dangerous situation, we neither receive salary nor respect here.”Later, the hospital dean and other officials intervened and held talks with them. The withdrew protest after they were promised that the issue would be sorted out.