Ludhiana: Last Wednesday, the Punjab government announced a one-and-a-half times (150%) stipend hike for undergraduate medical and dental students, fulfilling a demand put forth by trainee doctors, who had launched a campaign on social media.
However, not every intern at government medical colleges will benefit as a result of the state government’s decision.
Dr Reetika Goyal and Dr Balkaran Sher Singh are currently on their mandatory internship at the Government Medical College, Patiala, after completing four-and-a-half years of MBBS study. While Goyal will benefit from the stipend hike, Singh, who started his internship on January 1, 2020, will not be able to avail himself of it.
He is not the only one not being paid for his work; there are nearly 99 other MBBS interns working without any remuneration in Punjab’s government hospitals. This is owing to the fact that Singh and his colleagues, who are working in government hospitals, are former students of Gian Sagar Medical College in Patiala’s town of Banur.
In May 2017, Gian Sagar Medical College’s essentiality certificate was withdrawn by the Punjab government and its MBBS students were shifted to government medical colleges in Amritsar, Patiala and Faridkot.
Speaking to The Wire, Dr Balkaran Sher Singh said that he was posted in an emergency ward and his colleagues, who were posted in other departments, were on the frontlines in the fight against the novel coronavirus but were not being paid anything. The interns also had to buy protective masks with their own money.
Singh also claimed that former students from Gian Sagar Medical College had had to pay nearly three times the amount that government college students had to. While students at government colleges paid Rs 1,00,000 as fees for their third year, Singh and his batchmates paid Rs 2,62,000 to the Government Medical College, Patiala.
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Another intern at the Government Medical College, Faridkot, on the condition of anonymity, said, “In terms of the work, we do the same amount as every other intern does. But we don’t get a stipend. It is very disheartening. The exposure is equal for everyone. Duty hours are equal. While other interns were fighting for a hike in stipend, we were fighting for the basic right to get some salary.”
A letter, as seen by The Wire, issued by the college principal directs interns to attend to all of their duties and cautions that in the event that someone fails to attend to his or her duties without permission, the same would be written on their character and conduct certificate.
Archit Gupta, who is posted at GMCH, Amritsar said, “We are demanding basic rights but they are just ignoring us.”
Taking a cue from the Government Medical College students who managed to secure a stipend hike after a campaign on social media, trainee doctors have taken to Twitter with the hashtag #Justiceforshiftedinterns and #equalwork_equalpay to raise their demands.
“…Please don’t breach the golden words. Don’t deprive Gian Sagar interns of their basic right,” one Aurelia Goyal tweeted.
“When Gian Sagar was in crisis. We met u at #coffeewithcaptain and you said if you were in power you would definitely help us. Now, all we are looking forward is your help towards our STIPEND with u being in power,” Dr Arpit Gupta tweeted asking Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh for assistance.
Former Punjab Congress chief Pratap Singh Bajwa had earlier urged the Punjab chief minister to raise the stipend for medical interns and later thanked Singh when the stipend hike was announced. However, when former students from Gian Sagar Medical College asked Bajwa for help, he tweeted, “Definitely I will take up your issue too but once the government is a bit free from the present crisis.”
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In 2019, trainee doctors had approached the state high court seeking its intervention to obtain their stipends. On September 5, 2019, the Punjab and Haryana high court directed the government to take a decision on the petitioners’ claim for the payment of a stipend within four weeks. But not a single intern was paid anything.
On December 31, 2019, the petitioners completed their mandatory one-year internship without receiving any remuneration for their services.
Twenty-five-year-old Rajan Jindal, one of the petitioners who passed out of GMC Patiala and completed his internship last year, told The Wire that the petitioners had filed a petition in the high court seeking payment for their services, but even after the court’s decision, the interns were not paid anything.
Dr Deepak John Bhatti, the principal of Guru Gobind Singh Medical College, Faridkot said that students demand stipends from the government from time to time. However, upon being asked whether he had ever demanded that the government pay the interns, Bhatti said, “These students are not from our college. They are here due to government’s arrangement so that they can complete their studies.”
When asked about whether the interns deserved compensation for their hard work, Bhatti told The Wire, “What do you mean by hard work? Why are they working? Do you think they have any other option?”
When asked as to why some students were being paid a stipend while others were not, Bhatti said, “Other students secured their place in the college on the basis of merit. Why did these students take admission in Gian Sagar (Banur) college? The government played no role in the admission of these students. If tomorrow you park your money in some bank which then closes down, you can’t hold the government accountable as the government will say it never gave a licence for the bank to operate. Students wanted the government to shut down the college.”
However, contrary to Bhatti’s assertions, Gian Sagar Medical College was set up after due approval from the government. According to The Tribune, the essentiality certificate is a mandatory requirement for the establishment of a medical college. The college was shut down after the Punjab government withdrew its essentiality certificate.
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Secondly, the Gian Sagar Medical College was shut down after its management failed to pay its staff which led to the suspension of classes for months together. It was after that the government withdrew its essentiality certificate.
Thirdly the owner of the college was a politically influential person. The Gian Sagar Medical College was governed by Nirmal Singh Bhangu of the Pearl group, who had spent nearly Rs 35 crore over four years on the then Punjab deputy chief minister Sukhbir Badal’s Kabaddi World Cup.
An intern, posted at Faridkot, in response to Bhatti’s statement, said, “We don’t mind the duty, but we mind the inequality. We complete all of our shifts. I haven’t taken a single leave till now. It is about getting paid for work.”
Sujata Sharma, the principal of Government Medical College, Amritsar, told The Wire that only the government can make a decision about the payment of stipend to trainee doctors.
Note: The Wire tried to reach Dr Harjinder Singh, the Principal of Government Medical College, Patiala and O.P. Soni, Punjab’s Medical Education and Research minister but was unable to contact them. The article will be updated as and when a response is received.
Sandeep Singh is an independent journalist from Hambowal village, in Punjab’s Ludhiana district.
