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Bengaluru: The salaries of healthcare workers appointed under the National Health Mission (NHM) have been raised, in a bid to attract more applicants for vacant positions in Karnataka.
The state government's proposal to hike salaries has been approved under the centrally-sponsored scheme. The health department hopes that this will help them fill over a thousand posts that have been lying vacant due to comparatively unattractive salaries, said state health minister Dinesh Gundu Rao, on Wednesday.
According to data shared by the department, a total of 11,338 posts have been sanctioned under the NHM scheme. Of this, 8,105 staff nurses, 819 MBBS doctors and 594 specialists were working under the NHM in Special Newborn Care Units (SNCUs) and ICUs. A cumulative 1,820 posts lay vacant.
Now, the proposal to hike salaries has been approved.
The monthly pay for specialists, which is between Rs 1.10 lakh to Rs 1.30 lakh currently, will increase to Rs 1.40 lakh. Similarly, MBBS doctors under the NHM will get paid Rs 60,000, as opposed to the current pay structure of Rs 46,895 to Rs 50,000. New staff nurses will get a monthly salary of Rs 22,000, a hike from the range of Rs 14,186 to Rs 18,774 they are currently being paid.
This hike in salary will be applicable only to newly recruited personnel. Existing staff will continue to receive their current salaries. However, they can resign and reapply under the new recruitment process, according to the department. Preference will be given to current employees based on their experience.
Doctors in major clinical specialisations such as Obstetrics-Gynaecology, Paediatrics, Anaesthesia, General Medicine, Orthopaedics, Surgery, and Ophthalmology, who will apply to fill vacancies, will receive the initial salary of Rs 1,40,000. However, experienced candidates will be provided an additional 2.5 per cent increment per year of relevant experience at the time of their appointment.