LAHORE: Justice Ijazul Ahsan of the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Monday restrained young doctors from observing a strike and said they should do their professional duty of providing medical facilities to the ailing humanity.
The judge also sought a report until September 10 about the minutes of meeting scheduled to be held soon between the government and the doctors’ representatives.The judge issued the directions while hearing a petition filed by Judicial Activism Panel Chairman Muhammad Azhar Siddique seeking directions to cancel the licences of doctors on strike and scrutinise their medical degrees besides taking strict disciplinary and penal actions against them.
During the proceedings on Monday, Additional Advocate General Faisal Zaman informed the court said that a consensus between government and doctors on 42 out of 45 points had been reached and remaining issues would also be solved mutually within days. He said that the government intended to introduce a distinguished and best system in light of their cadre.He said that one-step promotion to doctors was not viable because it would be discrimination with the community in other provinces.
General Cadre Doctors’ Association President Dr Masood Sheikh submitted that general cadre doctors were in majority with more than 14,000 in Punjab and without rectifying their grievances, no suitable service structure could be finalised. He said that during the high-level meeting chaired by Senator Ishaq Dar, many of the demands of general cadre doctors had been principally approved, but their announcement was linked with the package deal with rest of the doctors’ representative.
He requested that when so many points of the general cadre doctors and other doctors representative had been principally agreed upon, there should be no delay in finalising the service structure and reaching a consensus.The petitioner said that Young Doctors’ Association (YDA) had again announced in a press briefing to start agitation campaigns from September 5 in support of their demands, which is contempt of court, so they should be restrained from depriving the people of their basic right.He also requested the court to declare the formation of the YDA illegal and un-constitutional. – Dailytimes
