On a sultry Tuesday morning (March 10, 2026), before the city had stirred to life, a few nurses of a super speciality hospital located on the banks of expansive Kochi backwaters in Ernakulam district of Kerala arrived at the entrance of their workplace.
Instead of hurrying in to attend to their patients, as they normally would, the nurses in their casual wear waited for others to join them. As the minutes passed, more nurses trickled in and the crowd began to swell.
Someone brought in a banner with the name of the United Nurses Association, the collective of nurses of private hospitals of the State, imprinted in large bold letters. A few others began sloganeering. Their voices echoed throughout the luxury hospital building even as some protesters waved the white flag of the organisation.
Similar scenes have been happeningacross few other private hospitals in the State as well with thousands of nurses protesting for the past few weeks, demanding a basic monthly pay of ₹40,000. Improved staffing levels and patient-caregiver ratio are among the other demands.
The crowd of nurses grew outside the hospital to a sizeable number as the day progressed. The summer sun started bearing down with all its intensity. However, the stifling heat could not beat the resolve of the nurses as sloganeering continued with renewed vigour.
Among the crowd stood Harsha P. Jacob, waving the loose fabric of her cotton kurta to catch a bit of breeze. She was there with over a hundred nurses, all protesting. At nine months pregnant, she was scheduled to start her maternity leave in a few days.
‘Long overdue’
Her friends would have understood if she didn’t show up for the protest. But this was a protest she couldn’t stay away from. So she arrived, day after day, standing from morning to evening, raising her voice along with the rest of her colleagues, demanding a pay raise. “The wage revision has been long overdue. We are struggling to make ends meet. The pay is extremely low and we have to run our families using this,” says Harsha.
While vehemently campaigningfor a wage hike, the protesters are quick to add that they are not abdicating their responsibilities to the patients who are left in their care.
“It is not that we do not care for the patients. It hurts us that we have to do this, to stand here and not do our duty when our patients are inside; they are like our family,” says Rahul Parakkaran, a male nurse at the hospital.
These were lines many other nurses would later repeat in unison. Nurses say they were forced to go on an indefinite strike after their repeated pleas for a wage revision went unheeded for years.
“We are forced to do this. A few of our colleagues are still inside caring for the patients, ensuring that patient care goes unaffected,” assures Rahul, who works as the team leader of the nurses in the operating theatre at the hospital.
By Wednesday, 429 private hospitals across the State expressed their willingness to revise the minimum wage to ₹32,700.
| Photo Credit:
H. VIBHU
As the protest entered the second day, the nurses decided to go for some innovative protest modes, which would enhance their visibility and canvass public support. Rahul told them they would collect donations from among themselves and would make porridge, a symbolic gesture to show the hospital management that the community is struggling to survive in the current economic conditions.
The crowd of nurses listened attentively as Rahul, along with other officials of the UNA, narrated the ordeals faced by their community. They raised slogans, calling for a better tomorrow.
The act left an electrifying effect on the protesters. The swelling crowd of agitators started walking towards the hospital. They hollered: “We want justice!”
As they raised their slogans and marched toward the hospital, the security personnel promptly stopped them midway. When vehicles entering and leaving the hospital struggled to move smoothly, the protesters were allowed inside the gates, where they sat and continued their protest.
Sheethu Antony, a native of Kottayam, has been working at the hospital for over nine years now.
“I came with my uniform,” says Sheethu, tapping her shoulder bag. “We are all ready to resume work the moment the hospital agrees to our terms,” she asserts.
Struggles of freshers
“The minimum wages must be increased. We are here because no one seems to care about how much we are being paid. It is only after this protest that people are realising how low our salaries really are. I see how much the new joiners struggle; they do not get remunerated well for the work they put in. I am here for them too,” she says.
K.C. Sijo, a fresher who had joined the hospital recently, cuts in and says how he has been put on probation for 1.5 years.
“It is quite difficult for the freshers. We are paid less everywhere. My friends in other professions earn higher wages. We chose this job because of our love for the profession. But at such low salaries, it is difficult to live in this economy,” he adds.
According to the association, wages have not been increased since 2019. It was in April 2018 that the last pay revision was implemented, following which the salaries were increased to around ₹20,000.
“Salary revision needs to be carried out every three years, or at least every five years. We have been demanding a revision for a long time. We had to resort to striking as our demands were not addressed,” says UNA national president Jasmine Shah.
“The current salaries in the private sector are insufficient to keep up with the rising cost of living. It is also not on par with those at the government hospitals. The nurses at the government hospital receive around ₹60,000 a month for the same services we provide in private hospitals,” he adds.
Token strike
Before taking the plunge, the nurses had gone for a Statewide token strike on February 21. As their demands went unheeded, the nurses went on strike on March 4. During this strike, one-third of the nurses in private hospitals continued to offer their services.
The widespread agitation prompted the State government to issue a draft notification revising the minimum wages for employees in the private health sector. It has proposed revised wages for GNM/BSc staff nurses that range from ₹25,450 to ₹30,800. However, the association and the nurses are far from satisfied and have decided to continue with their strike.
On Monday (March 9, 2026), the UNA launched the indefinite strike. The changed scenario following the government notification also forced the nurses to revise their strategies. It was decided that the nurses who were earlier asked to stay back and attend to their duty would join the protest.
Even then, a fraction of the nurses, who were part of the association, still showed up at the hospitals to aid in critical care even as the protests gathered momentum across the State.
“These nurses are rendering their services so that the patient care in critical emergency care isn’t disrupted,” points out Rahul.
“We gave private hospitals time to shift patients to other hospitals if needed,” says Shah.
Hospital owners’ take
At the same time, the hospital owners view the strike as an illegal one and the demands as unacceptable.
“The strike is illegal as the UNA did not serve the mandatory 14-day notice before they began protesting. There is a minimum wage structure that has to be followed. You cannot ask for a minimum wage to the tune of ₹40,000. How can small hospitals bear this increased financial burden? It could lead to the shutting down of small hospitals,” notes Anwar M. Ali, general secretary of the Kerala Private Hospital Association.
He argues that the increased wages could eventually make health care more expensive in the State.
“If such high wages are paid, hospitals may have to pass the cost onto the public, making treatments more expensive and potentially disrupting the health-care sector,” he adds.
By Wednesday (March 11, 2026), as many as 429 private hospitals have agreed with the UNA to revise the minimum wage to 32,700, points out Sha, while adding that the association represents nurses in only 490 private hospitals in the State.
INTUC State president K. Chandrasekharan, who pledges his supportfor the nurses, says the workers of the private educational and health sectors were mindlessly exploited.
No norms appear to apply to medical treatment in private hospitals, and many of them exploit patients. However, most of these hospitals pay only low wages to the nurses,he says.
CITU national vice-president and trade union leader K. Chandran Pillai says that the private hospitals are required to comply with the minimum wages that have been notified by the government.
The demands of the striking nurses include a basic monthly pay of ₹40,000, improved staffing levels, and patient-caregiver ratio.
| Photo Credit:
H. VIBHU
“In institutions where the minimum wages are not being implemented, the union can intervene and pressurise the management to implement the wage revision, “ he says.
Fear of future
Even while striking work, the protesters also harbour the fear that they would be victimised once they resume work.
“This is a fear most of the nurses have. But we are here on the protest path as we cannot live on frugal wages. It is high time we are compensated properly,” asserts Anita Mathayi, a nurse for over two decades.
“Don’t call us angels, but treat us as human beings,” demand the protesters as the strike enters another gruelling day.
