Overview
- The United Nurses Association launched the strike on March 4, mobilising nurses across as many as 490 private hospitals and clinics and staging a march to the state Secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram.
- The union demands a uniform ₹40,000 basic monthly salary for private‑sector nurses and an end to what it calls arbitrary layoffs targeting union supporters.
- Protesters link chronic understaffing to heavier workloads and poorer patient outcomes, pressing for improved nurse‑to‑patient ratios across private facilities.
- Nurses say salaries have not been revised since 2018 and seek implementation of earlier committee recommendations, asserting that a 2023 state order on pay hikes was not carried out.
- Services at many private hospitals are expected to be disrupted, though organizers say emergency care will continue, with a warning that the action could become indefinite if demands are not met.