Naila Altaf Kayani
Muzaffarabad, (Parliament Times) : Squatted on a green belt along a bustling road in the Chattar neighborhood of the Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) capital on Tuesday, the protesting employees of the Maternal New-born and Child Health (MNCH) program slapped down the territory’s ruling elite for “not giving a hoot about their peaceful agitation” despite the lapse of 10 days.
The employees of the previously federal government-funded project had started a sit-in on March 4 – the fourth protest since June 2020 – to press the AJK government to regularise their services and bring them on the normal budget on the pattern of four provinces and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB).
The MNCH program was transferred by the federal government to provinces as well as AJK and GB after the promulgation of the 18th constitutional amendment in Pakistan.
In AJK, around 1218 employees – 80 percent of them women – were inducted in the MNCH program in AJK between 2008 and 2018 as managers, doctors, lady health visitors (LHVs), community midwives (CMWs), clerks drivers, etc.
However, unlike the four provinces and GB, the AJK government could not fulfill its commitment to take these employees on its normal budget in post 18th Amendment scenario.
In December 2022, the AJK finance department had reportedly given concurrence to the creation of around 348 posts of MNCH in the normal budget. However, according to protesting employees, any notification to this effect was yet to see the light of the day.
Even though the green belt where the protesters had been gathering since March 4 catches the attention of everyone walking or driving past it, the employees said had been hurt by the impassivity and mercilessness of the ruling elite
It had rubbed salt into their wounds, they said.
As Tuesday – the first day of the Holy Month of Fasting – was a sunny day, heralding the advent of summery weather, many female protesters were sitting under their small sun umbrellas to beat the heat.
“We gather here daily since Monday last in a bid to shake the conscience of the public office holders and senior bureaucrats who daily drive past us in their luxurious vehicles, but to no avail,” commented Ms Sadaf from Kotli, who was accompanied by her son.
Talking to this scribe, she said: “I have been employed in this program for the past 15 years and it’s the height of injustice to deprive me and others like me of our livelihood on false pretexts.”
She said Ramzan was a month of blessings and invocations, but the rulers had no regard for it and so far none of them had visited the protesting employees.
“Let it be clear to them that if they fail to meet our just demands we will not abandon this protest and even celebrate the festival of Eid here,” she vowed.
Ansa Javed, an employee for the past six years in the project in Rawalakot, maintained that the female employees, some accompanied by children, were sitting under the open sky for more than a week, but so far no minister or secretary had bothered to contact and console them, even on humanitarian grounds if not as part of their responsibilities.
“They are apathetic and hard-hearted,” she said.
Ms Afshan, an employee from Hattian Bala, was more bitter.
“Previously, they gave us lollipops thrice. Seeing no action on their part we were compelled to launch a protest for the fourth time. Our prime minister [Chaudhry Anwarul Haq] is sitting in the capital and his office is less than 500 yards from here, but he has no time to listen to us which speaks volumes about his insensitivity,” she said.
She called upon the media to convey their plight to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif as well as to Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz.
“While our rulers cannot spare time to visit our camp from their nearby offices, Ms. Maryam may come from Lahore to listen to us because she is a kind-hearted lady,” Ms Afshan said.
She said since Ms. Nawaz was also the chief organizer of PML-N, which was a coalition partner in AJK, she could direct the AJK cabinet members from her party to play a role in addressing the issue of MNCH employees.
Sajid Azeem, the chief of the MNCH employees action committee, made it clear that the sit-in would continue until the acceptance of demands.
