KARACHI, Oct 5: While a half-done exercise regarding the recruitment of hundreds of skilled paramedical and administrative personnel for government health institutions at the provincial and district levels appears to be in limbo, the Sindh health department has planned to start a similar process this week.

Sources in the provincial health department said that the top hierarchy in the government believed that public sector hospitals and health-care facilities badly needed doctors and nurses as well as technical and administrative staff and a fresh recruitment process should be launched in response to the thousands of applications received against a couple of relevant advertisements published in national dailies about two-and-a-half months back.

The high-ups in the department have ordered opening and categorising of the applications received for jobs in grades 5 to 15 at two offices of the health department in Karachi, while the executive district officers (health) of the province are also being asked to furnish reports pertaining to applications received at their ends at the earliest so that a detailed policy and number of vacant posts in various hospitals and health units across the province could be finalised, added a source, saying that almost half of the advertised posts are yet to be approved by the competent authorities.

In the last year of the PML (Q)-MQM government, according to a source, after a long wait the health department had ventured for recruitment of specialists, doctors, nurses and paramedical and technical staff for government district and provincial health-care centres. However, the process that was launched in two phases separately for doctors and paramedical and technical staff could not be completed as the parties concerned could not reach a “posts sharing formula,” the source noted.

An attempt to revive the process was also made during the period of the caretaker government, but to no avail. In addition to the thousands of applicants, patients in rural areas, who have been left dependant on ill-equipped primary level health-care facilities, were among the worst sufferers of the continued absence of recruitments of doctors and paramedical staff.

The provincial health department had tested about 26,500 candidates for appointments under two categories, i.e. BPS-5 to BPS-11 and BPS-12 to BPS-15, on June 3, 2007. The results of the test, which were compiled under the supervision of the health department, however, remained unannounced till the departure of the then government and as such the interviews of the qualifying candidates — the last requirement for selection on merit — could not be held at the district level, which was prescribed by the then policy makers.

On the other hand those who had applied for jobs against vacancies in the general (grade 17), and specialist cadre (grade 18) of doctors and the nursing cadre (grade-16) could be issued only the results of the written test in the last days of the interim government.

When contacted by Dawn, the secretary of the Sindh Health Department, Mohammad Hussain Syed, said that he hoped the recruitment process for new applicants in grades 5 to 15 would begin on Oct 9.

“There will be no written tests this time and only interviews of candidates will be held by committees formed at the district level. An advertisement in regard to proposed interviews will be given to newspapers in a couple of days,” he said.

Off hand, he could not give the exact number of candidates or valid vacancies available with the provincial and district government’s health-care facilities but maintained that the data would be finalised shortly as he had already convened a meeting of EDOs (health) on the subject.

‘Hiring on merit’