Salary woes in public sector

Dear Mr Editor, please allow me the privilege of getting this letter published in your newspaper to put certain things in their proper perspective.

I am a very proud product of the Sri Lankan free education system. A major part of my schooling and the undergraduate education were funded by the people of Sri Lanka. I qualified from the Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo in 1970 with my basic medical qualification of MBBS(Ceylon) 2nd Class Honours. In 1975, I went to the UK for my postgraduate studies at my expense, secured employment there, completed my postgraduate degrees and came back to Sri Lanka in 1978.

The Sri Lankan Ministry of Health very kindly granted me no-pay study leave in 1975 to go to the UK for higher studies while retaining my position and seniority in the Ministry pf Health. I have been intensely conscious of the dispensations that were given to me by my motherland. That is the reason that I returned back to Sri Lanka giving up a most lucrative position in the UK. My wife, who was also a doctor, and I, felt we owed a lot to our country.

On my return I was posted as the Consultant Paediatrician to the General Hospital Badulla for 6 years, then to General Hospital Ratnapura for three years, to General Hospital Kurunegala for 2 years, General Hospital Kalubowila for 4 years and then to the Lady Ridgeway Hospital for Children, till my retirement at age 60 years. In my first three appointments, I was the only Consultant Paediatrician for miles around and was called upon to serve the children of these areas 24/7. I did not mind the very busy tough life in these peripheral hospitals as I was paying my dues to the country which gave me everything that I had. I was very much of a wanted citizen in these areas and the people in those localities treated me and my family extremely well. They practically venerated the ground that I walked on.

When I came back from the UK in 1978, my salary went up by seventy-five rupees for the postgraduate qualifications, compared to the salary that I got before I went to the UK. Still for all that, the salary was considered to be in the higher echelons of the public service. I secured the service-based grade promotions in the public service and at retirement in the year 2007, my last salary was around Rs 71,000 per mensem. Now I get a monthly pension of around Rs 94,000/-. Of course, when taken into consideration in the face of the current cost of living expenses, this amount is perhaps the bare minimum for survival.

I have provided all these details because of the current discussions at many levels regarding the salaries of the Sri Lankan Central Bank employees. It makes me totally disappointed and even disgusted, to see what is happening in that scenario. Just for comparison a so-called Grade 1 management assistant, a glorified title for a peon, gets Rs 241,623 monthly as the salary, while a Grade 5 peon gets Rs 421,184. A top-grade executive will be getting a top-grade six-figure salary.

As so graphically expressed by an anonymous writer over the social media in Sinhala “Ekko rata palayan, neththan maha bankuwata palayan”, meaning “Either go abroad, or go to the Central Bank”. The implication of that statement is that one is as lucrative as the other.

O TEMPORA! O MORES!

Dr B. J. C. Perera 

MBBS(Cey), DCH(Cey), DCH(Eng), MD(Paed), MRCP(UK), FRCP(Edin), FRCP(Lon), FRCPCH(UK), FSLCPaed, FCCP, Hony FRCPCH(UK), Hony. FCGP(SL)

Specialist Consultant Paediatrician and Honorary Senior Fellow, Postgraduate Institute of Medicine, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Joint Editor, Sri Lanka Journal of Child Health

Section Editor, Ceylon Medical Journal

Past President, Colombo Medical School Alumni Association (CoMSAA) – 2015

Past President, Sri Lanka Medical Association (2013).

Founder President, Sri Lanka College of Paediatricians (1996-97)