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Haryana health staff revive agitation against geo-fencing attendance system
Employees had observed a hunger strike at all civil surgeon offices and district civil hospitals against the decision on August 28.
Members of the Swasthya Vibhag Karamchari Talmel Committee, Haryana, have called a meeting of functionaries on September 7 to take a call on a fresh agitation against the state government’s decision to implement the geo-fencing based attendance orders for health department employees.
Haryana Civil Medical Services Association (HCMSA) president Dr Rajesh Khyalia said that the health employees had observed a hunger strike at all civil surgeon offices and district civil hospitals on August 28 against the geo-fencing attendance management system.
The health employees had held a protest from 9am to 5 pm on August 28 and submitted memorandums in the name of Haryana governor Ashim Kumar Ghosh and urged him and the state government to reconsider the decision.
“The doctors and health workers delegation had apprised health minister Arti Singh Rao on July 8 over the potential cyber security threats associated with the mobile application such as unauthorised access to sensitive personal data stored on mobile devices, increased risk of cyber frauds and data misuse. She assured our delegation of resolving the issue but to no avail,” Dr Khyalia said.
Dr Khyalia said since the geo-fencing attendance system mandated installation of a mobile application on personal devices to track doctor’s location, it amounted to a breach of privacy, which is a fundamental right as upheld by the Supreme Court in its August 24, 2017, judgment in the Justice KS Puttaswamy versus Union of India case.
The health department employees said that they already register their attendance based on a biometric attendance system and there is no need for registering attendance under geo-fencing-based attendance management system.
