IMA launches 3 days Nationwide strike
Pan-India docs go on day long protest in solidarity with Kolkata medicos
Source: The Sangai Express / IANS

New Delhi/Imphal, June 14 2019: The doctors' strike that started in Kolkata earlier this week has now spread across India with the doctors' association of AIIMS showing full support to their West Bengal colleagues.

On the other hand, the Indian Medical Association (IMA) launched a three-day Nationwide protest from Friday to express solidarity with the doctors agitating against the attack on their colleagues in West Bengal and called for a strike on June 17 with withdrawal of non-essential health services.

The apex body of doctors in the country also renewed its demand for a Central law to check violence against health care workers in hospitals and said it should have a provision for a minimum of seven-year jail sentence to violaters.

In view of the continued suffering of the resident doctors and repeated occurrence of such incidents without redressal, the IMA has decided to continue their protest on Saturday and Sunday as well, which will include wearing black badges, dharnas, peace marches and has requested support from all associations of the fraternity to join the agitation, it said, reports PTI .

IMA launches 3 days Nationwide strike

The Indian Medical Association (IMA) Manipur State branch also observed the Nationwide protest on violence against doctors today.

A press release issued by the president of IMA, Manipur State branch mentioned that the organisation took up the agitation following the increasing cases of violence against doctors and healthcare establishment, particularly the recent incident in West Bengal during which one Dr Paribha Mukherjee, a young doctor, was brutally attacked by a violent mob at NRS Medical College, Kolkata. .

After entire healthcare system in West Bengal was crippled over the past four days, now doctors' in Delhi, Mumbai and other cities in India especially AIIMS hospitals in the National capital, Raipur, Patna and Punjab are observing protest shutdown.

Resident doctors in several Government hospitals in Kerala and Hyderabad also staged protests as they started their 'cease work' demonstrations in respective cities.

Around 4,500 Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) stopped attending to patients in all the 26 Government hospitals in the State simultaneously on Friday.

MARD General Secretary Deepak Mundhe told IANS the doctors will keep off all routine duties between 8 am and 5 pm.

and the hospital administration has been informed to ensure all other services are not hampered or patients inconvenienced.

A large number of doctors gathered outside the KEM Hospital with banners, posters to express solidarity with the doctors who were assaulted in Kolkata on Tuesday following the death of a patient in a State-run hospital.

Similar protests were also being held in Pune, Aurangabad and Nagpur by MARD members who are demanding adequate protection for their counterparts in West Bengal.

Senior and junior resident doctors of several Government hospitals in the National capital on Friday also went on the one day token strike and boycotted work.

Except for emergency services, there will be full shutdown of all outpatient departments (OPDs), routine operation theatre services and ward visits, the AIIMS association said.

Resident doctors at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and Safdarjung hospitals carried bandages on their heads in a symbolic protest and suspended all non-emergency services.

Only follow-up patients with a prior appointment were being registered at the OPDs.

Diagnostic services were also functioning in a restricted manner.

Several resident doctors also held a protest at the Jantar Mantar against the brutal attack on a Kolkata intern.

Condemning the violence in Bengal, the AIIMS Resident Doctors' Association (RDA) has urged all the RDAs across the country to join the token strike.

The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has also asked members of all its State branches to stage protests and wear black badges on Friday.

Junior doctors in West Bengal are on a strike since Tuesday after two of their colleagues were attacked and seriously injured at the NRS Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata.

In the wake of the strike, the AIIMS has instituted contingency measures to take care of the admitted patients.