KARACHI, May 22: The College of Surgeons and Physicians (CPSP) on Thursday disaffiliated the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre with immediate effect, asking it not to induct trainees under the FCPS-II programme.
The extreme step was taken after a number of reminders to pay Rs6,210 per month to every FCPS-II trainee as stipend, the president of CPSP told Dawn. Dr Sultan Farooqui said in August a government notification had been issued specifically ordering the JPMC to pay stipend to the trainees.
“The stipend money was supposed to be paid from December 2002,” he said. “However, in violation of this order the hospital didn’t pay a single penny to the FCPS-II trainees.”
The CPSP president said the hospital was in fact collecting Rs1,200 annually from each trainee in the name of ‘tuition fee’. “This amount doesn’t go to the treasury as it’s a non-governmental fund.”
In response to a question, Dr Farooqui said only the JPMC’s administration could say what was done with the money collected as ‘tuition fee’. He said the doctors who had already completed the requirements of FCPS-I and were working at JPMC as trainees of FCPS-II would continue to work there.
“We are asking the government to ensure that these people get the money which is rightfully theirs.” The president of the CPSP went on to say that the JPMC had never been authorized to collect any amount as ‘payment fee’.
The CPSP president pointed out that the Lady Dufferin Hospital had been de-recognized not long ago over the same issue. “We had sent them several letters, asking them to start paying the stipend. But they kept insisting that since they were a charitable organization, they couldn’t. Then we decided to disaffiliate them. A few days later they changed their mind and started paying the stipend.”
Dr Farooqui told Dawn that the Lady Dufferin Hospital was again being recognized as a centre for offering FCPS training positions to doctors. “The status of Lady Dufferin Hospital is being restored as a centre for FCPS training from today.”
Meanwhile, the CPSP letter informing the JPMC director of the extreme move was signed by the registrar of the college — Dr Abdul Majid. It said the FCPS-II trainees were ‘major service providers’ to the JPMC and the refusal by it to pay stipend to them was creating a ‘perturbing situation’.
The letter reminded the JPMC administration that payment of stipend was mandatory. The JPMC had been disaffiliated indefinitely and with immediate effect by the CPSP, it said.
The letter said all the FCPS-II trainees were supposed to get the stipend. “Non-payment of stipend deprived the trainees of their legitimate rights.”
The issue of stipend has created a lot of bad blood between the JPMC’s postgraduate doctors and its administration. Back in January, the postgraduate doctors had called a strike and sought to meet the federal health secretary, Ejaz Rahim, who was visiting their hospital at the time.
The health secretary, however, had declined to meet the striking doctors on the grounds that he had already taken the necessary steps and asked the federal government to create a fund for the PGs’ stipend.
The previous week the Postgraduates’ Action Committee had staged a demonstration in front of the director’s offices.
This reporter tried on Thursday to reach the JPMC’s director a number of times on Thursday night but without any success