Not enough vehicles: 350 drivers in Health Department getting paid without doing any work

KOLLAM: They come to duty every morning, sign the attendance book, and then sit idle. This is the 'duty' of about 350 permanent drivers in the health department for two and a half years. This is not their fault. The reason is that the department does not have enough vehicles. With vehicles older than 15 years being withdrawn from the roads in March 2023, the department has only 278 vehicles. The driver posts in the department are 666, including temporary ones.

Half of the drivers have no work to do due to the shortage of vehicles. The government is also unable to purchase new vehicles due to financial difficulties. At the same time, there are 417 ambulances in general, district, taluk hospitals, family, community and primary health centres. These are run by appointing temporary employees using the funds of the Hospital Management Committee.

Although these additional permanent drivers can be assigned to ambulances, the health department is not ready. Only a few have been assigned in this way. If the duty is arranged in this way, the salary paid to temporary drivers from the HMC fund can be used for other needs of the hospitals. However, there are allegations that the unions are pressuring against the reassignment of permanent drivers to ambulances.

Drivers' Salary Scale

Driver Grade 2.......................... 25100- 57900

Driver Grade 1.......................... 27900- 63700

Driver Senior Grade............ 31100- 66800

Selection Grade Driver.........39300- 83000

Daily Salary of Ambulance Drivers........................................ 770