Inclusion of Doctors to gazette on 60 years compulsory retirement suspended

14 December 2022 06:50 pm Views - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}} 7 Bookmark

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The Court of Appeal today issued an interim order suspending the inclusion of Doctors and consultant specialist doctors from a gazette notification issued reducing compulsory retirement of government sector employees to 60 years. This interim order will be effective until January 25.

The Court of Appeal two-judge-bench comprising Justices Sobhitha Rajakaruna and Dhammika Ganepola made this order consequent to a writ petition filed by 176 consultant specialist doctors.

The petitioners are Specialist Consultants in varied fields of medicine including Cardiology, Cardio-Thoracic Surgery, Oncology, Neurology, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Haematology, Opthalmogy, Histopatholy, Anaesthesia, Paediatrics and Auto-Rhinolaryngology.

The petitioners are challenging the decision of the Cabinet of ministers dated 17-10-2022. They alleged that this decision has been made illegally and in complete violation of their legitimate expectation to continue in service at least until 63 years of age.

The Petitioners stated that since 2017, as consultant specialist doctors, they have been guaranteed a defined compulsory age of retirement of 63 years, by both Cabinet Decisions as well as by the Amendment to the Minute on Pensions with effect from 6.6.2017, and therefore, that they were distinctly identified as a separate category, different and separate to that of other categories of public officers in general and that this status and legitimate expectation had been continuing for a period of 5 years, from 2017 upto 2022.

Sanjeeva Jayawardena PC
with Counsel Lakmini Warusevitane, Dr. Milhan Mohamed appeared for the petitioners. Uditha Egalahewa PC and Manohara De Silva PC appeared for seven other petitioners.(Lakmal Sooriyagoda)

Comments - 7

Baskaran Wednesday, 14 December 2022 07:40 PM

Now others to follow to have their legitimate expectation of retirement to 65. If they really wanted to treat patients then why don't they do that voluntarily. Other than a tiny few, all of them are a greedy bunch!

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I T Thursday, 15 December 2022 08:14 AM

Why should they do voluntarily. You didn’t study for the 15 years they did… The reason why they have longer retirement age is - 1) by the time a doctor becomes a consultant it’s roughly 40. So there is no use leaving such trained professionals stay at home. Instead we can make use of their expertise. 2)you can say they are all greedy, no one forced anyone to go to a particular dr. You can choose someone who isn’t.

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Thanar Wednesday, 14 December 2022 08:33 PM

Our education system is arranged to project the doctors and the engineers as the most important professions. Look at the A/L scores, those who get the highest marks get into medical or engineering faculties. This is true not in Sri Lanka but in all third world country. Getting the high scores in A/L is not a sign of intelligence it only says they did sufficient past examination papers and thus prepared well for the exam. Any person who has done the last ten year past examination papers would get at lest 80% in the exam. That is why all those medical and engineering students entering universities with high exam scores, after they leave the universities we never hear about them at all. Because they can’t discover or invent anything, they lead just ordinary lives. Passing and scoring in exams is a tactics not related to intelligence

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Unemployed Graduate Thursday, 15 December 2022 05:11 AM

Yes it means they have the ability to learn from experience to recognise patterns and solve problems in society. Every AL candidate in Sri Lanka has the same opportunity. If training oneself to handle problems from teaching oneself to recognise patterns is the key to University Entrance then one cannot fault the smart candidate. Bill Gates, Steve Jobbs and Mark Zuckerberg are all innovators and none of them had University Degrees but they employed others. Food for thought.

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I T Thursday, 15 December 2022 09:58 AM

So how do you propose we choose them then?

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Amal tennakoon Thursday, 15 December 2022 11:34 AM

If they have so much of opportunity why are the ones about to go on traning so desperately flooding Linkedin the moment government stopped funding their training?? If all other professionals can find their own scholarships etc for postgrad why cant doctors? It dont shows how much they are not in demand outside of Sri Lanka Compare the numbers migrating. In computing and Engineering fields more than 50% of top notch grads leave the country. For doctors the numbers are extremely low because they have the least opportunities abroad. For Sri Lankan medical graduates every country requires sitting for additional exams which requires multiple years and personal funds. Some countries even with this don’t accept Sri Lankan medical degrees(e.g. Singapore). Whereas other tech professionals can directly go into well paid jobs. Even with higher education Sri Lankan medical grads don’t get a lot of opportunities abroad compared to other tech grads.

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Amilani Thursday, 15 December 2022 01:27 PM

One more point, after 60 how many are physically fit to practice, with weak eye site etc?

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