The junior doctors in West Bengal, who held cease work protest for 41 days over the brutal rape and murder of a trainee medic at Kolkata's RG Kar Hospital last month, are threatening to resume their strike. The protesting doctors, who renewed the threat after a mob attack on medics at a state-run hospital on Friday evening, said they will resume their agitation after a hearing of the RG Kar case in the Supreme Court on Monday.
The medics alleged that the attacks at the state-run hospital have shown that the state government has "totally failed" to deliver promises to provide them security. Three doctors and three nurses were assaulted following the death of a patient at the College of Medicine and Sagore Dutta Hospital near Kolkata on Friday night.
"The state government has totally failed in providing us safety and security and that is the reason the attack took place in Sagore Dutta Hospital. We are giving the state some time and want to hear their submission regarding our security during the Supreme Court hearing on Monday and then from 5 PM, we will start total 'cease work' at all hospitals across Bengal," news agency PTI quoted one of the junior doctors as saying.
The doctor noted that it seems that their meetings with the chief minister and the chief secretary were not taken seriously. "How can patients' family members threaten one of our female colleagues to repeat what has happened at the RG Kar hospital? We do not feel secure in the hospitals, we lost all hope in the state government," he said.
The decisions were announced following a junior doctors' general body meeting held after the assaults on medics at the Sagore Dutta Hospital. Soon after Friday's incident, junior doctors at the Sagore Dutta Hospital have already started "total cease work" there.
On Sunday, junior doctors are also reportedly planning to organise a rally across the state, protesting the Sagore Dutta Hospital incident. "Where gone the assurances on our safety and security. We will go for a bigger demonstration," Aniket Mahato, a doctor who was also present there, said.
Depending on the submission on the part of the Bengal government in the Supreme Court hearing on Monday, junior doctors might contemplate whether to go for "total cease work or not", Mahato said.
Junior doctors on September 21 rejoined their duties partially at various government-run hospitals in West Bengal after a hiatus of 42 days. They were on 'cease work' in protest against the rape-murder of an on-duty woman doctor at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital.
Junior doctors had on Thursday written an email to Chief Secretary Manoj Pant, reiterating their demands which were "yet to be fulfilled" by the state government. In the two-page letter, representatives of the West Bengal Junior Doctors' Forum referred to their meeting with him at the state secretariat on September 18 when their demands "were verbally agreed".