ISLAMABAD: Employees of the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) on Thursday urged the government to notify the separation of the hospital from the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Medical University (SZABMU) and put the hospital on schedule III so that the 1,000 vacant seats in the hospital can be filled.

They have also demanded that the Quaid-i-Azam Post Graduate Medical College be notified so that the 70 faculty members of the hospital can start teaching since they have refused to join the Federal Medical and Dental College (FMDC).

During the PPP-led government, parliament had passed the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Medical University, Islamabad Bill 2013. Under the bill, Pims was upgraded to a medical university and the hospital was attached to the university.

The legislation affected employees as they became employees of the university and was deprived of facilities such as the allotment of plots and government accommodation.

The employees have held a number of protests and token strikes since. The strike which started on Oct 2, 2017 was the longest yet and lasted for three weeks and a day, during which almost 10,000 patients were affected.

The federal cabinet approved a bill for the separation of the hospital from the university on Oct 25, 2017 after which the strike was called off.

The bill was passed by the National Assembly on Nov 6 last year and by Senate on Jan 24.

Pims Employees Association spokesperson Dr Asfandyar Khan said the employees held a meeting on Thursday to discuss the issue.

He said that the bill regarding the separation of the hospital and the university was published in the Gazette of Pakistan on Feb 2.

“We are not expecting for our issues to be addressed without further effort. But it also seems that our problems and those of our patients may not end soon. The file for putting the hospital in schedule III has been going to and fro between the Establishment Division and Cabinet Division.

“There are 1,000 vacant seats which cannot be advertised unless the hospital is put on schedule III because only then will the hospital become government property and the process of recruitments can be started,” he explained.

He said the appointments will be delayed by another eight months if the election schedule is announced as posts cannot be advertised and appointments cannot be made during election campaigns.

“The new government will also take some time before starting the appointment process,” he said.

Dr Khan said now that the university and hospital are separated, some 70 faculty members who work in Pims do not have a higher educational institution to work at.

“They were offered to join FMDC, but they refused. In the past, we had the Quaid-i-Azam Post Graduate Medical College, which should be notified again so the faculty members can be attached to it. On the other hand, we do not have a full time executive director of the hospital after the retirement of Dr Altaf Hussain,” he said.

The government should allot a 200 kanal plot for the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Medical University because employees and students of the university are worried about their future, he added.

Published in Dawn, March 9th, 2018