Cuttack, Aug. 7: The Odisha government has conceded that no homoeopathic or ayurvedic doctors have been appointed since Orissa High Court issued directions for filling up 245 vacant posts 13 months ago. Similar has been the case with the 203 vacant posts of Ayush doctors.
In an affidavit filed in the high court, Odisha health and family welfare special secretary (technical) Basanta Kumar Mishra said the posts of homoeopathic and ayurvedic medical officer had been upgraded to Class II posts. New recruitment rules are also being finalised for these posts.
The affidavit filed by the government mentioned that the posts of ayurvedic and homoeopathic medical officers were upgraded with effect from December 26, 2008.
On June 27, 2011, the high court had fixed a 12-week deadline for the Odisha government to fill up all the sanctioned posts of allopathic, homoeopathic and ayurvedic doctors lying vacant across the state.
The court had issued the direction on a PIL after the Odisha government filed an affidavit admitting that 1,085 of the 4,258 sanctioned posts of allopathic doctors were lying vacant in Odisha.
Some 151 of 594 sanctioned posts of homoeopathic doctors were lying vacant, while 94 of 520 sanctioned posts of ayurvedic doctors had no takers. Besides, 203 of the 1,476 posts of Ayush doctors, sanctioned under the National Rural Health Mission, were also lying vacant. The issue of vacancy in posts of doctors across Odisha returned to the high court with the filing of a contempt petition. Keonjhar Zilla Surakhshya Parishad secretary Dillip Kumar Mohapatra filed the contempt petition seeking “appropriate action for non-compliance of order”.