This threatens the job opportunity for thousands of Nursing students from government colleges. Opposing this, students from Government colleges all over Tamil Nadu have launched the agitation. At the same time, nursing students studying in private colleges also agitated for their jobs. Authorities and government of Tamil Nadu are trying to crush this just struggle for employment and setting students of Government and private colleges against one another.
As soon as Jayalalitha, present Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu came to power in 2011, she tried her best to block the uniform system of school education program in Tamil Nadu in order to protect the loot by the Matriculation schools. Government’s order to offer jobs for the students from private colleges is another program brought by Jayalalitha with similar reactionary aim. Men of AIADMK, Congress, BJP, DMK like parties and the capitalists with their support have built these private colleges and making huge profits. These private institutions are not functioning to train Nurses needed for medical services of our country. Instead they loot huge profits from the pitiable students who could not get educational opportunity. Order of Jayalalitha government and court’s judgment that private college students should also be considered for jobs in government positions is in support of the private school capitalists who are looting the students. Through this order, government is trying to set the nursing students from private and government colleges against each other and divert their struggle for rights for their jobs.
As such the government has not offered any employment even for the nursing students from government schools for the last 4-5 years since 2008. Honourable court has not raised the question when there are over 3000 nursing positons are vacant in Government hospitals, why has the government not employed the waiting 8000 jobless nurses. Without taking any steps to employ them, government of Tamil Nadu and Judiciary are diverting the issue.
Government is pretending to be concerned about the plight of the nursing students of private colleges. Few months back, thousands of nurses working in private hospitals most of them are from private colleges, went on struggle against the brutal exploitation and demanding job security and livable wages. Why then the government and the Judiciary did not intervene to take action on the private capitalists who are exploiting the nurses and order a minimum wages of Rs.25,000 to them?
Statistics show that in Tamil Nadu there is one nurse for 1200 persons. However minimum standards demand that for every 500 persons there should at least be one nurse. Similarly Doctor – Nurse ratio in our country is 1 to 1.4 while the minimum standard should be 1 to 3. It was estimated that the shortages for Nurses all over India is over 11 Lakhs and in Tamil Nadu it is over 50,000. Thus the strength of nurse in our country should be raised much. It is the barbarism of the capitalism and Indian rulers that thousands of qualified and trained nurses are idling without job and suffering without a livelihood at one end. Other end, lakhs of our our patients suffering without adequate number of nurses to provide them care and medical services. Indian rulers responsible for this state and they must be ashamed of it!
It is a prime duty of the government to provide employment for all the people qualified and willing to work. Lakhs of our people are suffering due to various avoidable diseases and dying due to lack of basic medical and health facilities. If situation is corrected and enough hospitals and other medical infrastructure is built in this country, lakhs of doctors, nurses and other para-medical staff would be required to provide the services. Then, all our eligible people would get adequate employment while all our population would get sufficient health services and facilities. In order to build additional nursing infrastructure as well as to protect the interests and future of nursing students in private colleges, government should immediately acquire all private nursing colleges without giving any compensation to the capitalists.
Nursing students have temporarily postponed their agitation, based on the assurance of officials of Government of Tamil Nadu that they would look into their demands. Lokraj Sangathan fully supported the struggle of the students and worked for their victory. Lokraj Sangathan issued a leaflet in support of their struggle. Leaflet pointed out amongst other things, as the current political and economic system India is based on the exploitation and profits, it is not possible to take measures of providing health services to all our population which will also provide livelihood for its people. We must change this system to serve the interests of the working people. While fighting unitedly for our rights, we must also fight vigorously to end the rule of most reactionary parties and to establish rule of toiling people, leaflet said. It raised the demands to the Government to “Provide immediate jobs for all nursing students”, “Provide permanent jobs to all the nurses waiting for jobs or working as casuals and on contract”, “Without any compensation acquire all private nursing colleges”, “Open adequate number of medical hospitals with all modern facilities”, “Fill up all vacant positions for Doctors and nurses”, “Set and implement the minimum starting wages for nurses as Rs.25,000”.
This leaflet of Lokraj Sangathan was distributed in thousands to nursing students in various nursing colleges in Tamil Nadu. To read the leaflet in TAMIL CLICK HERE
