AJK Govt Urged to Address Health Employees’ Issues on Emergency Basis

Muzaffarabad: Central Joint Secretary of Pakistan Muslim League-N Azad Kashmir Women’s Wing, Jamila Khatoon, has called on the Azad Jammu and Kashmir government to take immediate and decisive action to resolve the pressing issues faced by health department employees.
Speaking to journalists in Muzaffarabad, she emphasized that the Secretary Health and Director General Health must play a constructive and proactive role in addressing the concerns of employees who are serving under challenging conditions with comparatively low salaries.
She urged Raja Faisal Mumtaz Rathore, along with the Chief Secretary, Health Minister, and senior health officials, to take urgent notice of the situation and ensure relief for workers on the frontlines.
Jamila Khatoon highlighted that the health department in AJK is already facing a severe shortage of essential staff, while vacant posts remain unadvertised. At the same time, longstanding issues affecting paramedical staff, nurses, Lady Health Workers, and Allied Health Professionals continue to remain unresolved.
She pointed out key demands, including the establishment of a proper service structure, provision of health allowances on a running basis, rural area allowances, resolution of pension issues under national health programs, and the inclusion of programs such as the MNCH and National Immunization initiatives into the regular budget framework. She also stressed the need for fair representation of paramedical and allied staff in administrative positions.
Criticizing what she termed as discriminatory practices, she stated that these healthcare workers are contributing significantly—handling nearly 80 percent of the workload—and are actively engaged in serving humanity, often under difficult circumstances.
She further remarked that it is deeply concerning that during the holy month of Ramadan, healthcare workers, including women with young children, are compelled to protest on the streets for their basic rights. She warned that failure to resolve these issues could lead to large-scale protests or strikes, potentially crippling the healthcare system and worsening the plight of the underprivileged.
Calling for immediate intervention, she urged the health department bureaucracy to abandon what she described as a biased approach and instead focus on resolving the issues efficiently. She noted that in the past, doctors’ concerns were addressed on a priority basis, and demanded that the same urgency and fairness be extended to paramedical and allied health staff.
Jamila Khatoon concluded by stressing that the bureaucracy’s role is to facilitate solutions rather than complicate matters, and called for an end to all forms of discrimination within the health department.