When there is a wield across the whole India for the eradication of corruption, each and every time new laws are brought to play a role, there is a trend opposite to the conventional one going on in this district especially in the hospitals.
|| UMER WANI
At the time when the state authorities claim to be mulling for providing better health care facilities to the people in valley, UmerWani provides a detailed picture about Kashmir’s worsening health sector. Hospitals in Kashmir can be dangerous places, swarming, raucous, contaminated and reeking. They are often undermanned, short on medicine and breeding places for disease. The hospitals mirror the places they serve. One such example is District Hospital Anantnag. Most people do not have a reliable supply of clean water at hand and neither do the hospitals in the state Jammu and Kashmir, which is considered to be the paradise with clean water. Around the world, about one billion people do not have reliable access to clean drinking water. And each year nearly two million people, mostly children under the age of five and young mothers, die from diarrhoea and similar diseases that they pick up from the only water available to them.
Some of the people get sick from water in hospitals. The number of deaths from impure drinking water could be significantly reduced. Aid workers and government officials know how to provide clean drinking water. But the money goes elsewhere. The District Hospital Anantnag that caters the population from whole South Kashmir and Banihal regions also is going through a messy state of affairs and the institution has become a cesspool of corruption and authorities have been mute spectators all the years. All the eyes are now focused on the Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, that he will take some steps to set this institution right remains a big challenge before him.
The hospital has newly constructed building in which medical ward, surgical ward, ophthalmology ward have been merged into a single ward. What least the patients and the attendants can expect is clean water and wash rooms. It is testimony that neither water and nor the wash rooms in the said hospital are clean, which further adds to the spread of infectious diseases. I myself is the witness of the arrogance of the security guards and the ward attendants in the said hospital, who kick the patients out of the emergency wards. Doctors are not able to do justice with the patients, as they have to take care of their clinics as well. No one bothers to scrutinize the wrong activities that are going on in the hospital.
When someone takes the initiative of examining the hospital records, suddenly the record room catches fire as it has happened in past too. The hospital has become den of the corruption. Corruption among senior and junior employees in hospitals is very rampant and nothing new.
Every employee of both the hospitals is always in a chance to get some money coughed out from the patients and their attendants by hook or crook method. There is clear favoritism in each and every corner of the hospitals of this district whether it being the district hospital or the lone maternity hospital of the district.
This is not a matter of concern for only a single person or the person who is admitted in the hospital or the person accompanying him, but it is grave concern for all of us, a grave concern for the whole society. The so called most reasonable citizens of our society, the doctors who are looked as an icon by everyone are behaving in a very discourteous manner. This nuisance needs a way out and needs to be eradicated once at all. Every member has to wake up for his own cause. We have to work together as a group, like the birds who worked together to get rid of the fowler.
Either you have to be in good terms with the staff or you have to grease their palms. For getting medical examinations done like ECG or other tests you have wait alteat 02 or 03 days after enrollment for the same if you don’t turn up to the above two factors of corruption.
The government has put up posters in hospital walls alerting the public not to give bribes in exchange for rightful services. But still, I am myself witness to the testimony that how the attendants of the patients are being forced to pay what lawfully is the duty of the employees. Another good example of the messy affairs of the health department is the lone children and maternity hospital Anantnag. Usually normal deliveries do not happen in the hospital due to the inadequacy of the doctors posted there, who spend more time in their private clinics rather than in the said astray hospital. Both the hospitals in the district have a common thing, that no one has been transferred from the said hospitals to any other.
They have created a mafia, where they do the things at their own will. The need of the hour is that authorities should transfer the doctors, employees, staff who are currently in place from past so many years. This will help in transparency and accountability of the health department in general and the district in particular. In general, it is the common Kashmiri who suffers at the hands of these white collared butchers, who is having no political, administrative approach that he will be treated well in the said hospitals. When there is a wield across the whole India for the eradication of corruption, each and every time new laws are brought to play a role, there is a trend opposite to the conventional one going on in this district especially in the hospitals.
The staff in these hospitals is not punctual to their duties. For getting prescription tickets you have to be in a queue for at least half an hour. This delay in issuing tickets is only and only because they do arrive late of the schedule time for duty. Then they get indulged in receiving phone calls and gossips.
Every employee of both the hospitals is always in a chance to get some money coughed out from the patients and their attendants by hook or crook method. There is clear favoritism in each and every corner of the hospitals of this district whether it being the district hospital or the lone maternity hospital of the district. Either you have to be in good terms with the staff or you have to grease their palms. For getting medical examinations done like ECG or other tests you have wait alteat 02 or 03 days after enrollment for the same if you don’t turn up to the above two factors of corruption. The staff in these hospitals is not punctual to their duties. For getting prescription tickets you have to be in a queue for at least half an hour.
This delay in issuing tickets is only and only because they do arrive late of the schedule time for duty. Then they get indulged in receiving phone calls and gossips. This is not a matter of concern for only a single person or the person who is admitted in the hospital or the person accompanying him, but it is grave concern for all of us, a grave concern for the whole society. The so called most reasonable citizens of our society, the doctors who are looked as an icon by everyone are behaving in a very discourteous manner.
This nuisance needs a way out and needs to be eradicated once at all. Every member has to wake up for his own cause. We have to work together as a group, like the birds who worked together to get rid of the fowler. It is high time to intervene in the matter and I appeal the authorities of the State Jammu and Kashmir to intervene especially the Governor of the State, as he is considered to be a statesman and has a good experience to deal with such cases.
UmerWani hails from Malaknag area of district Anantnag and can be reached at: [email protected]
