The Aam Aadmi Party and the BJP have traded blame over unpaid wages in five hospitals run by the North Delhi Municipal Corporation, which has prompted a hunger-strike from Friday by five doctors at Hindu Rao Hospital and the threat of an indefinite cease-work.

The BJP, which controls all three municipal corporations in Delhi, has blamed the crisis on the AAP-run state government’s alleged withholding of more than Rs 18,000 crore in funds to the civic bodies.

The state administration says the corporations owe it around Rs 10,000 crore for multiple services, and that a bailout would merely fall into a bottomless pit of debt.

Doctors at all the five hospitals have announced a “mass casual leave” on Monday, and an indefinite strike from Tuesday if a lasting solution was not found to the repeated delays in salaries, seen over the past two years.

At a news conference on Sunday, AAP leader Durgesh Pathak condemned Saturday’s transfer of four chief medical officers (CMOs) from Hindu Rao to another corporation hospital. He said the four were being punished for participating in wage-delay protests.

The orders said the transfers were being carried out “in view of the exigency of services due to the strike of senior resident and junior residents”.

“For the last 10-12 days these Covid warriors are protesting. Now they are on hunger strike for the last two days. They have met BJP leaders, the mayor and others to solve this problem but nothing has happened,” Pathak said.

He said that if even a tenth of the Rs 18,000-crore budget of Delhi’s municipal corporations were used efficiently, the crisis could be resolved.

BJP spokesperson Praveen Shankar Kapoor told The Telegraph: “North DMC has not transferred any doctor; only a very short period deputation has been allowed from HRH to Rajan Babu Institute of Pulmonary Medicine and Tuberculosis to meet the urgent need for doctors there in the diphtheria season.”

He said the AAP should “stop playing dirty politics in this health emergency” and its government should “extend a financial package immediately” to help end the crisis.

The salaries have been unpaid for at least three months. Earlier this month, the North DMC had cleared a month’s wage arrears.