Thiruvananthapuram, June 18 (IANS) The 46 Kerala
nurses stranded in strife-torn Tikrit town in northern Iraq Wednesday
asked the Indian embassy officials to either take them home or change
their place of work.
Speaking to IANS over phone from Tikrit, the
hometown of deposed and executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein now
under control of Sunni militants, a Kerala nurse said the Indian embassy
officials speak to them over phone every day and find out if they have
taken food while also enquiring about their safety.
"Yesterday
(Tuesday), a Red Cross official first came and spoke to us. Later,
another official came and took our details. We have told them and the
embassy officials that either we be given a job in a place away from
Tikrit or get a safe passage back to Kerala," said the nurse, not
willing to be identified.
Of the 46 nurses, 30 reached Tikrit last August while the rest arrived in February.
Following
a change in the local government in Tikrit, their contractual
obligations have changed and now they have been promised pay of just
$200 a month while earlier it was $750 per month.
"We are staying
put in our residence here and eagerly waiting to hear good news. We are
sitting in our rooms, as we have no idea of media reports of 40 Indians
being kidnapped from Mosul It's about 60 km from here. For the past two
days, we did not hear any sound of explosions. We are all praying,"
added the nurse.
The office of Kerala Chief Minister Oommen
Chandy told IANS it is in touch with the external affairs ministry in
Delhi, which is giving directions to the embassy officials.
Kerala nurses in Iraq's Tikrit say salaries cut
(19:24)
Thiruvananthapuram, June 17 (IANS) Nearly 50 nurses
from Kerala working in Iraq's Tikrit city have been struck a double blow
as not only have they been affected by the strife there, but their
salaries have also been cut drastically.
A nurse told IANS over phone from Tikrit that 46 nurses were working at a government hospital in Tikrit.
"Thirty
of them reached here last August, while 16 came this February. They
were all promised a monthly salary of $750. But today (Tuesday), a new
manager told us that the government that hired us has changed and now
the new government can only pay $200," said the nurse, whose identity
has been withheld.
She said the nurses want to return at the earliest.
"We hear sounds of explosions outside, but since we are inside the hospital complex, so far we have had no issues.
"The
major issue is the dramatic drop in our salary. Most of us have come
after paying Rs.1.5 lakh as recruitment charges. For those who came in
February, till date no salary has been paid, and now they say we have to
work with a reduced pay," the nurse said.
She said they were in touch with the Indian embassy in Iraq and the Red Crescent and asked them for jobs in other hospitals.
"We are all praying that something works out," she said.
Meanwhile,
another nurse from Kerala working in the Baghdad Medical City, where
there are 15 hospitals, said they were "absolutely safe" and got their
salaries on time.
"When reports of the unrest surfaced, the
hospital management was told they need not fear anything and that we
were perfectly safe.
"We have not been affected and there has
been no explosions or unrest in our place. The management has told us
that if anyone wants to leave, they can," the nurse said.
Another
nurse from Kerala who works in the Karbala region, about 70 km from
Baghdad, told IANS that they had no problems and everything was normal.
The
office of Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy told IANS that it was
keeping close contact with the external affairs ministry and a meeting
will be held soon to take stock of the situation in Iraq.