Chitwan, June 3

Employees at the Health Department under Bharatpur Metropolitan City launched an agitation today demanding salary.

The agitating employees staged a sit-in in front of the Metropolitan City Office and padlocked the Health Department of the office.

Health Department chief at the metropolis Jivan Kumar Shrestha said that as many as 104 employees, including five doctors appointed on contract basis, had not received their salary for the last five months. He said that they had faced the problem as the Department of Health under the Ministry of Health did not provide the required budget. According to Shrestha, the Department of Health has to release additional Rs 21.6 million for salary.

Earlier, the Department of Health at the ministry had sanctioned only Rs 23.5 million though they had demanded Rs 44.4 million.

Bharatpur Metropolis Chief Administrative Officer Netra Subedi said they had failed to provide employees’ salary due to the budget crunch. “We are not in a condition to provide salary from internal sources,” he added.

After the country adopted the federal structure, all health centres have come under the local levels. In line with the same provision, all the health centres and facilities have come under the local levels in Chitwan.

There are 13 health posts, one primary health centre, eight municipal health centres, one community health unit and six ayurvedic pharmacies under Bharatpur Metropolitan City.

Some local levels are managing salary and allowance for health workers from internal sources in the district.

Ratnanagar Municipality Mayor Narayan Wan said that his municipality had managed salary of health employees on its own as the Health Ministry did not provide the budget. “All the employees are equal as all departments have come under the municipality. We managed to pay salary to health workers.“