The ESI Corporation during its 179th meeting held today under the Chairmanship of Shri Santosh Kumar Gangwar, Minister of State (I/C) for Labour and Employment has taken some very important decisions towards improvements in its service delivery mechanism.The audited Annual Accounts of the ESIC for the year 2018-19 along with the Report of the Comptroller & Auditor General of India and draft Annual Report for the year 2018-19 were adopted in the meeting for onwards forwarding these to Central Government. As per the Annual Report 1,77,444 additional factories/establishments were brought under ESI Scheme during the year 2018-19 taking total figure to 12,11,174. The no. of Insured Persons/family units rose to 3.49 crores from 3.43 crores of previous year. The expenditure on medical benefit rose to Rs. 8721 Cr. in the year 2018-19 as against Rs. 6867 Cr. of previous year.In order to reduce the stress of ESI beneficiaries due to delay in the treatment and non-provision/unavailability of few super-speciality departments/ Doctors in ESIC Medical College & Hospital Sanathnagar (Telangana), K.K Nagar (Chennai) & Faridabad (Haryana), the Corporation in its meeting approved the proposal for creation of additional new super speciality pots viz. oncology, Neurology, Nephrology, Gastroenterology etc. It will help providing these super-speciality medical cares in medical colleges/hospitals besides cutting down tertiary case referrals and consequent SST expenditure.
Considering the high bed occupancy in ESI Hospital, Durgapur the approval for upgradation from existing 150 beds to 250beds was accorded in the meeting.The proposal for reconstitution of Local Committee under Regulation 10A has been approved in the meeting in order to have grass root level monitoring in each district of benefits & facilities available under the scheme as mandated under ESI Act, 1948.The proposal to start 3 Year DNB (Post MD/MS/DNB) courses in Super-Speciality disciplines at ESIC Super Speciality Hospital, Sanathnagar has been approved.Shri Gangwar released ESIC Diary 2020, ESIC Calendar, 2020 and ESI Samachar on the occasion. The Theme of Calendar 2020 and Diary 2020 is ESIC Vision 2022 featuring the latest initiatives to augment the reach of ESI Scheme and strengthen service delivery.The other dignitaries participating in the meeting were Shri Heera Lal Samaria, Secretary, Labour & Employment, Sh. Raj Kumar, Director General, ESIC, Smt. Anuradha Prasad, Addl. Secretary, Labour & Employment, Representatives of Employees and Employers and ESI Corporation Members, Members of Parliament, representatives of State Govts.