The Delhi High Court has upheld the legality of the city civic body’s decision mandating marking of attendance by all employees of its two hospitals through a mobile application, saying the measure was taken for improving the healthcare system and instilling discipline and accountability among its employees.
Justice Chandra Dhari Singh dismissed the petition by the Paramedical Technical Staff Welfare Association of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) challenging the policy and said that without measures to ensure attendance and accountability, there was a “real risk of systemic failure in the healthcare sector.”
He rejected the petitioner’s contention that the new system of marking attendance amounted to an infringement of the employees’ right to privacy.
“In the present case, the implementation of the application is intricately connected to the initiative of instilling discipline and ensuring accountability among employees, particularly in terms of attendance. This decision can be unequivocally characterized as a measure taken for the improvement of the healthcare system,” said Justice Singh in a recent order.
“The decision to introduce the application is a strategic and necessary step toward fortifying the healthcare system and sustaining the vital contributions of the staff and therefore, the same cannot be interfered with by the Court since the same is not illegal,” the court held.
The petitioner had sought a direction for quashing an August 2022 order of the MCD which said the salaries of all employees of Rajan Babu Institute of Pulmonary Medicine and Tuberculosis (RBIPMT) and Maharishi Valmiki Infectious Diseases Hospital (MVID), which included members of the petitioner association, will be released only after they marked their daily attendance through the MCD SMART App.