In a show of massive support for the protesting junior doctors, the senior faculty at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata - in the eye of a massive storm over the rape and murder of a trainee doctor - resigned today.
Visuals on social media showed students clapping as 50 senior doctors submitted their resignations.
The junior doctors have been on hunger strike since Saturday demanding justice for their colleague, against an alleged corruption-threat syndicate, for campus democracy and a patient-friendly system at the facility. Their other demands include the establishment of a centralised referral system for all hospitals and medical colleges in the state, the implementation of a bed vacancy monitoring system, and the formation of task forces to ensure essential provisions for CCTV, on-call rooms, and washrooms at their workplaces. They are also demanding increased police protection in hospitals, recruitment of permanent women police personnel, and swift filling of vacant positions for doctors, nurses, and other healthcare workers.
The decision of mass resignations came as "there has been no response from the appropriate authority to solve and to save our children from impending health disaster".
Earlier today, around 15 senior doctors joined their juniors in solidarity by staging a symbolic hunger strike.
The agitation by the junior doctors comes amid Durga Puja festivities in Kolkata, where the spirit of the festival has been dampened by the heinous incident.
West Bengal Chief Secretary Manoj Pant on Monday assured that 90 per cent of the ongoing projects at medical colleges in the state would be completed by next month, urging the protesting doctors to return to work.
"I am requesting everyone to come back to work and give services to the people. Some of them already have. We are all working towards improving the environment. They (junior medics) will appreciate that very good progress has been made on the promises made by the government," he said at the state secretariat.
"I will request them all to join duties. What they want is a safer environment and we are working towards that. There is a positive intent from everybody's side. There is no difference of opinion so far as over larger objective is concerned," he added.
The junior doctors started a 'cease work' protest following the rape and murder of the fellow medic. The postgraduate trainee doctor was found murdered at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital on August 9 during her duty hours. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) - which is probing the case - has charged Sanjoy Roy, who used to work with Kolkata Police as a contractual staff, with the rape and murder of the doctor.
The stir was ended after 42 days on September 21 following assurances from the state government to look into their demands.
However, the doctor renewed their 'total cease work' on October 1 after an attack on medics by a patient's family at the state-run College of Medicine and Sagore Dutta Hospital the previous week but called it off on October 4 and started the sit-in and 'fast-unto-death' a day later.
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