Kashmir
Protesting NHM employees face batons
Srinagar, Feb 12: Police on Tuesday foiled the protest march of National Health Mission (NHM) employees here.
They have been on strike for the last 27 days, demanding regularization of their services and implementation of Supreme Court guidelines of equal pay for equal wages.
Hundreds of NHM employees including doctors assembled at Pratap Park here, where they have been on strike since it began.
Carrying placards and raising slogans in favour of their demands, they took out a march and proceeded towards Regal Chowk.
They were stopped by the Police near Kothi Bagh Police station. After stiff resistance, police first sprayed chilli gas to disperse them and later resorted to lathicharge and arrested scores of them.
Talking to the Kashmir Monitor, one of the protesters, Bashir Ahmad said that they would continue with their strike, till their demands were met.
“We have been demanding regularization and implementation of Supreme Court (SC) guidelines of equal pay for equal wages. Our demands should be met at an earliest,” he said.
“We can give some more time to the government for the formulation of regularization policy, provided it implements the SC guidelines of equal pay for equal wages in our favour without any delay,” he added.
“We have been working relentlessly, providing our best for the patient care but the government is doing nothing to address our issues,” said another protester, Mir Imran.
“No social security benefits are being provided to us. For the last three consecutive years, J&K has secured top ranking in the primary health care sector. The mortality rate has come down,” he said.
Srinagar, Dec 10: J&K Bank has lowered its marginal cost of funds-based lending rate (MCLR) by 0.10 percent for various tenors. The move is in line with the regulators directions to pass on the benefit of reducing cost of funds to the borrowers.
The bank after reviewing the MCLR for different tenors lowered its benchmark one-year MCLR to 8.45 pc from 8.55 pc effective from December 10, 2019.
The marginal cost of funds-based lending rate (MCLR) is the minimum interest rate that a bank can lend at and is a tenor-linked internal benchmark.
The Reserve Bank of India introduced the MCLR methodology for fixing interest rates from 1 April 2016. It replaced the base rate structure, which had been in place since July 2010.
Srinagar, Dec 09: In view of inclement weather, the Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir, Baseer Ahmad Khan today chaired a high level meeting to review arrangements made by the Line Departments.
The meeting was attended by Additional Commissioner, Kashmir, Bilal Ahmad Bhat, Directors of Food, Education & Urban Local Bodies, Chief Engineers of PDD, PHE R&B and PMGSY, Commissioner SMC, Principal GMC, GM JKSRTC, SSP Traffic, Additional Deputy Commissioner Srinagar, Joint Director Fire & Emergency, Staff Officer to IGP, SP (Headquarter), Deputy Directors of Health & MET, Superintending Engineers of MED & PDD, SP Traffic (Rural), Executive Engineers of MED, NHAI & BEACON, Senior officers of SKIMS, Project Head RAMKY and other concerned officers of Line Departments were present in the meeting whereas Deputy Commissioners of nine districts of the Kashmir division participated the meeting through video conferencing.
The Divisional Commissioner sought detailed feedback from Deputy Commissioners and officials of concerned Departments regarding stock position of essentials including food grains, LPG, Petrol, Kerosene oil. He also sought present status of electricity & water supply, buffer stock of power transformers, additional water tankers, deployment of snow clearance machines, functioning of Control Rooms of Line Department & Disaster Relief Centers and SDRF, besides heating arrangements in Hospitals, Medical supplies, presence of doctors and paramedic staff in health institutions.
The meeting also discussed present status of National Highway, Mughal Road & Srinagar-Leh Road, besides helicopter services and winter dumping of essentials in far-flung areas.
Mechanical Engineering Department (MED) informed the meeting that 154 snow clearance machines were already distributed among the districts.
The Divisional Commissioner directed Mechanical Engineering Department (MED) to gear up their men and machinery. He also directed them to position adequate number of snow clearance machines at various locations.
BEACON AND RAMKY was asked to ensure the timely deployment of men and machines on the Airport and National Highway for snow clearance. The concerned departments were asked to send location-wise details of snow clearance machines to the respective Deputy Commissioners immediately.
SMC Commissioner was directed to frame duty roaster for all Muncipal wards of the city indicating deployment of staff as well as machinery. He was asked to ensure that all measures are put in place to clear snow from lanes and bye-lanes besides deploying de-watering pumps in the low lying areas.
The Divisional Commissioner warned that no laxity in snow clearance operations will be tolerated and any delinquency in this regard will be stringently dealt with.
In order to avoid unscheduled power cuts, The Div Comm directed PDD to adhere to the power scheduled in letter and spirit besides ensuring to enhance the buffer stock of additional transformers at each district.
Chief Engineer PHE will ensure hassle free water supply to the public while augmenting water tanker service.
The Health authorities were asked to ensure adequate heating arrangements, while ensuring sufficient availability of medicines during the winter in all the health intuitions of Kashmir division.
Director Food was directed to ensure availability of kerosene oil to all districts as per schedule.
The Divisional Commissioner directed Deputy Commissioners to conduct surprise inspection of control rooms of concerned departments and ensure their round the clock functioning so that people get real time information about essential services. He directed the concerned DCs to ensure wide-publicity of contact numbers of Control Rooms though print and electronic media.
Jammu, Dec 9: Financial Commissioner Health & Medical Education Department, Atal Dulloo today chaired a meeting to review the progress on various utility works going on at the AIIMS institutes in Jammu and Srinagar.
The meeting discussed the land acquisition issues, construction of approach road, provision of water supply, electricity, construction of boundary wall and other related aspects of the project.
The FC enjoined upon the officers to work in tandem and close coordination to complete the utility and other construction works at both the places in a time bound manner.
The meeting was attended by various officials from Central Public Works Department, Public Health Engineering Department, Power Development Department, Public Works Department, Revenue Department, Director (Coordination), New Medical Colleges Jammu.