GVK management calls for end to strike

SHILLONG, July 27: The management of GVK EMRI 108 Services has asked its employees not to disrupt emergency services and call of their strike in the interest of the suffering citizens of the state.
A GVK EMRI official on Wednesday said they have served the people of Meghalaya for more than 13 years, attending to more than three lakh emergencies and saving more than 30,000 lives besides assisting in more than 2,500 births.
“Sufficient manpower is deployed maintaining a healthy ratio to adequately man the ambulances and call centre. Salaries are released timely in accordance to the minimum wage notification of the Labour department,” the official said.
The official also maintained that on an average, 50 cases are handled daily across the state and an average of 400 calls land daily translating to 15 calls per hour and 5 calls per response officer per hour.
In the last three months (April – June, 2022) the total calls landing at 108 were 33,435 with a call response efficiency of 97.2%.
“Unattended calls are just 0.3% which is much below the benchmark. This is due to landing of multiple calls at the same time. A total of 3,511 cases were handled from April to June 2022. The urban response time during this period stands at 17 minutes and rural response time stands at 22 minutes,” the official said.
The official also referred to reports in a section of the media on July 27 which carried views and statements that are factually not correct.
“Misinformation is being spread to mislead the employees may be due to vested interests of some persons. GVK EMRI refutes such allegations made that are baseless and unethical,” the official said while adding that by disrupting the emergency services, needy citizens of the state are being denied ambulance services when they need them the most, thus endangering lives.