The Hynñiewtrep Youths’ Council (HYC) has put up four demands before NEIGRIHMS, which it believes local youth would get an opportunity to get employment as well as for studies in different courses offered by the institute.
The demands include an increase in the number of MBBS seats for students from Meghalaya starting from the current session. The HYC said since out of the 50 seats only 14 have been reserved for Meghalaya there should be an increase since other North Eastern states including Nagaland have stated their own medical colleges.
The organisation also wants reserved seats for the youth of Meghalaya who wants to pursue M.Sc and B.Sc nursing courses from the session 2024 onwards and not based on the merit list of All India NEET examination.
The HYC also demanded the institute to amend the Recruitment Rules (RRs) vide advertisement dated October 17, 2023, which was for the recruitment to the post of Store Keeper. “By putting an essential condition of “Possessing Diploma/Degree in Materials Management / Warehousing Management / Purchasing /Logistics/ Public Procurement from recognised University/ Institute”…is an indication of the management’s attempt to deny especially the local indigenous candidates who are having years of experience in service in the related field to apply for the same,” HYC said.
Stating that even institutes like AIIMS, New Delhi does not provide for such a stringent condition but recognised the importance of experiences in the related field for such an appointment the organisation demanded NEIGRIHMS to stop any further appointment until corrective measures are put in place.
The HYC has also asked the NEIGRIHMS to take steps to appoint local indigenous serving nurses, who has the experiences and qualifications to be appointed in the vacant posts or a one-time absorption policy should be implemented to absorb all those nurses who have been employed on contractual basis for a considerable period of time in the Institute.
The demand stems from the organisation’s claim that about 40 to 50 persons who have been appointed as Nursing Officers during the last recruitment drive through NORCET have either not joined/reported for duty or have resigned from the posts.
“Any attempt to fill up the vacant posts from the eligible list of the recently concluded NORCET will not be acceptable to us as we had made our stand clear during the last meetings with you. Efforts should be made to do the recruitment process by NEIGRIHMS itself using OMR methods for a swift and smooth process,” the HYC said.
Furthermore, the organisation demanded that any non-tribal entity providing any kind of services to NEIGRIHMS must have a valid trading licence from the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC) as the institute is situated in a tribal area under the jurisdiction of the district council.
The demand was raised after the HYC noted that the tenders for procurement/purchase, etc. floated recently by the Store & Procurement Section, NEIGRIHMS does not have a provision for insisting on a trading licence from KHADC. “This is completely unacceptable and the person/persons responsible for this non-insistence on Trading Licence from KHADC should be taken to task and necessary action be taken by the Institute,” it said.
