Junior doctors on strike at NRS Hospital and other state-run hospitals want “live coverage” of their meeting at West Bengal’s administrative headquarters at Nabanna on Monday.
The doctors have been on strike since Tuesday after one of them was beaten up by relatives of a 75-year-old patient who died at the NRS hospital. The relatives alleged that negligence had led to the death. A junior doctor who was beaten up by the relatives of the deceased had to undergo a surgery and is still admitted in a private hospital with head injury.
The strike that started last Tuesday, spread soon to various state-run hospitals and now, a nation-wide strike by doctors has been called all over the country on Monday.
On the first day of the strike, MOS health Chandrima Bhattacharya visited the hospital and when she was present, chief minister Mamata Banerjee wanted to speak to the doctors over phone, which they turned down.
The following day, Banerjee went to SSKM Hospital and threatened to take action against the doctors if they didn’t get back to work within four hours. The doctors refused to call off the strike and demanded unconditional apology from her for threatening them, asked her to visit the junior doctor in hospital, and were firm that talks with her over calling off the strike can only take place if the CM visits NRS Hospital.
The junior doctors refused to attend meeting – twice over a period of two days – with the intervention of five senior doctors. Banerjee issued an appeal on Saturday saying no firm action will be taken and that the strike should be called off in the interest of poor patients.
Late last night, the doctors agreed to visit Nabanna (which they were earlier against) and accordingly, a meeting was scheduled. However, this morning, the junior doctors said there was no question of attending the meeting as they hadn’t been officially invited. They also demanded that the meeting should be covered “live” by television channels.
Following this statement by junior doctors, a letter was sent by the Director of Medical Education, officially inviting them for talks at Nabanna.
Later, the junior doctors gave yet another statement: the only way they would attend the meeting, they said, would be after the government mentions in a letter that the meeting would be “covered live, as the entire nation and the world is looking at us eagerly to know what happens at the meeting”.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee gave permission for this condition placed by junior doctors, but it is also the decision of the media houses whether they would want to telecast the meeting “live”.
