2 more months on the job for NACO's HIV +ve workers

CHANDIGARH: National AIDS Control Organization, after serving notices of termination of service to its 200 HIV positive outreach workers nationwide, is now offering them a chance to work for two more months.
But the step is not being taken out of empathy. Rather, NACO intends to outscource the outreach work to a private agency — Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS) — and as the signing of the agreement for that has been delayed, the HIV positive staff are being asked to stay back at the Integrated Counselling and Testing Centres (ICTCs).
NACO’s deputy director general, Damodar Bachani, said, “IL&FS will need two months to ascertain who should be let go.”
The outreach workers had to disclose their HIV status to get the jobs. They were the first set of positive people to be given this work.
They were given a salary of Rs 3,000 per month. One of the outreach workers in Punjab, Kuldeep, who has also been given a letter of termination, said, “There are 16 such people in the state, who are threatened with job loss. Once the private agency takes over, we will work at their discretion.”
Chandigarh has seven outreach workers. Deepak, working at the ICTC here, said, “The agency can select or reject us. We will move Supreme Court.” Already, some of these workers in Chandigarh have approached Punjab and Haryana High Court. Their lawyer Veena Sharma noted, “Things can get more complicated after the work is outsourced, as the evaluating agency will not be legally responsible. We are trying to move apex court soon.”
On August 25, a letter was issued to the State AIDS Control Society, Chandigarh, to terminate the services of these HIV positive people with a month’s notice. Gujarat State AIDS Control Society’s joint project director, Rajesh Gopal, said, “The purpose behind this proposed outsourcing is not known. But it seems to be a way of adding another department to the organization, which might limit accessibility for officials and other people.”