Krishnagar, Sept. 12: The government has decided to engage on contract around 4,000 doctors in health centres run by the panchayats.

“We have asked the panchayats to use as many doctors as possible. However, each doctor will have to attend the health centre at least thrice a week,” said Bankim Ghosh, the junior panchayat and rural development minister. “The doctors will be paid Rs 500 a day and travelling expenses.”

Panchayat department officials, however, admitted that it won’t be easy getting doctors ready to serve in the villages.

“We have decided to target those fresh out of medical college. District magistrates have been told to get in touch with the local Indian Medical Association (IMA) branches,” said Ghosh.

Homoeopaths and ayurveds were engaged in the rural health centres earlier in the absence of enough allopathic practitioners.

“But the villagers have realised that emergency operations like Caesarean sections cannot be performed by homoeopaths or ayurveds. So, there is an increasing demand for allopaths,” a panchayat department official said.

“One of the tasks of the doctors will be to conduct an awareness campaign against quacks and practitioners of alternative medicine,” he added.

The government would tie up with two nursing homes in each district to handle complicated maternity cases.

“The government will bear all the expenses for those below the poverty line. Those above the line will get subsidised facilities,” the minister said.

The decision to engage doctors at the panchayat level was aimed at making the rural bodies self-reliant in providing basic health services.

Earlier this year, the pan- chayat department took up a project to construct health centres in its offices. Work is on and the nearly 4,000 rural bodies are expected to have health centres by the end of this year.

“We plan to gradually upgrade these centres into hospitals,” said Ghosh.

Government doctors were earlier asked to treat patients in the rural centres at least once a week. “But the doctors could not take the extra burden. So, we had no other alternative but to seek the help of private doctors,” the minister said.

“There is tremendous pressure on doctors in the district hospitals and health centres. It will be good if the panchayats run their own centres,” director of health services Sanchita Bakshi said.

Nadia, which has 187 panchayats, has only managed to convince five doctors to attend rural health centres. “We are talking to the IMA for more,” said .S. Meena, the Nadia district magistrate.

“We cannot force a doctor to go to a village. We are trying to convince them,” said the Nadia secretary of the IMA.