Retirement age issue: AIIMS faculty body for rotating headship

New Delhi: The Faculty Association of AIIMS (FAIIMS) Wednesday said the institute's governing body's proposal to raise the retirement age for faculty to 67 years, should be implemented only after the introduction of "rotating headship" for various departments.

The decision to raise the retirement age of the faculty at the premier institute was taken on October 21 in a meeting of the institute's governing body chaired by Union Health Minister J P Nadda.

The FAIIMS held a meeting on the matter this evening at the campus and discussed it.

"Regarding the decision of the administration to increase the age of superannuation from 65 to 67 years, majority of faculty in general body expressed their strong opinion that the age should be increased only with implementation of rotating headship for the respective department," the FAIIMS said in a statement.

The association said that even if the retirement age of the faculty members has to be raised, there should be a rotation for the post of the head of the department and it should not be held by the one holding it now.

According to the FAIIMS, the rotating headship policy has been already "approved by the governing body" of the institute in 2012 which must be implemented "without any further delay".

"A few young faculty members disapproved increase in superannuation age," the statement said.

The Resident Doctor's Association (RDA) of the institution has, meanwhile, written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, expressing "strong opposition" to the institute's proposal to increase the age of retirement for teaching faculty.

Sources said one of the factors for the decision of increasing the age was to address the shortage of doctors at the institute.

"The initiation of this process is for favouring few hand count numbers of seniors faculties who are going to retire soon," the RDA alleged.