PESHAWAR: The Medical Teaching Institutions have been converting the budget for recruitment of the institutions’ employees against the law according to which the sanctioned posts of civil servants approved by finance department cannot be utilised for other purposes, according to sources.

“The Supreme Court of Pakistan has also taken notice of irregularities in employment by MTIs in May last year but the directives of apex court have fallen on deaf ears,” they said.

The latest attempt is being made at Khyber Teaching Hospital where the budgetary allocation by finance department is being utilised to hire institutional employees. Last week, senior doctors at KTH wrote a letter to the administration, asking it to reveal the minutes of the BoG’s meeting held on February 27 wherein the conversion of civil posts into institutional ones was decided.

Sources said that about 90 posts, majority of doctors, were being filled with civil servants at KTH. The MTIs have been appointing staff on lucrative salaries ranging from Rs200,000 to Rs600,000 from the budget meant for salaries of civil servants.

Amount meant for salaries of civil servants is utilised to hire institutions’ employees

The government enforced Medical Teaching Institutions Reforms Act, 2015 in nine tertiary care hospitals where the employees were asked to become institutional employees but majority of them opted to stay as civil servants as they wanted to be eligible for pension. There is no clear policy about future of institutional employees.

Under the law, the MTIs are run by Board of Governors, with vast powers of creating and abolishing posts but it doesn’t have the legal authority to utilise the amount meant for the salaries of civil servants.

The affairs of the civil servants are managed by the provincial government, which allocates the amount for their salaries in the budget.

Under the law, the MTIs can make appointments from its own resources but cannot convert the positions of civil servants into institutional posts unless the provincial assembly passes a law in this regard. Legally, the MTIs can appoint people on fixed pay.

In 2016, chief minister has also warned the MTIs against demolition of the posts of civil servants and appointment of people from the same budget for the institutions but the practice continues.

The MTIs have been appointing doctors and other staff as institutional employees directly.

“This will deprive the civil servants of their right to promotion to next grades due to allocation of the budget to the newly-recruited people,” said sources.

They said that it would badly impact the promotion of doctors, who were waiting for it under a four-tier formula, which allows promotion on the basis of strength of employees.

This practice, if not stopped by the government, would reduce strength of the civil servants and they would lose chances of promotions. Under the four-tier formula for doctors’ promotions, they are promoted to next grades on the basis of their strength in different grades. The health department has been asking the MTIs to recruit people from the amount generated locally because the government allocates the salaries duly approved by the finance department.

In 2017, health department complained that MTIs transferred the civil servants outside but didn’t send their salaries that caused problems because finance department could not pay them.

Published in Dawn, March 31st, 2019