NASHIK, Dec 23: The Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC) is in a fix over ad hoc appointments of about 800 staff members, with 11 independent corporators staging a token hunger strike in front of the civic headquarters yesterday.

The agitators submitted a memorandum to municipal commissioner K P Bakshi, pointing out that NMC had been appointing staff members for the past ten months without following due procedures. They said 800 persons had been recruited in just one month, flouting all norms. The 11 corporators demanded that all "illegally" recruited employees be sacked immediately.

Giving a seven-days ultimatum to the civic administration, the corporators demanded action, failing which they would intensify the agitation. It may be recalled that in a similar controversy in October 1994, NMC had, on the pretext of countering the plague threat, recruited 170 persons in defiance of all procedures. All the 85 corporators, then present, had recommended the names of two persons for recruitment. The greatest qualification of the recruits was their proximity to the corporators.

Initially recruited for a month, the services of the recruits were extended by another six months and then regularised. This system of employment became a regular feature at NMC, continuing even after the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance wrested power in the NMC from the Congress party last year.

Campaign against bogus doctors: NMC has launched a campaign against illegal nursing homes and bogus doctors following the death of a 27-year-old woman, Manisha Dilip Thakre, during abortion at the clinic of Dr R N Pandya on Saturday.

In another incident, the death of a Shiv Sena activist of an overdose of anaesthesia at Dr Pandya's hospital in Satpur led to the hospital being mobbed by Sena activists. The Sarkarwada police station arrested and later released Dr Pandya on bail. Incidentally, a case had been registered against Dr Pandya last year following a complaint from Sunil Dhandge, whose wife Rohini developed complications after the termination of her pregnancy.

The death of Manisha led to a campaign against quacks and illegal nursing homes and abortion clinics. The data is being compiled by NMC health superintendent Dr K B Bhosale. However, NMC has not yet approached the Maharashtra Medical Council or the state health department.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.