Calcutta High Court refuses to pass interim order on doctors' strike

14 June,2019 07:15 PM IST |   |  mid-day online desk

The court also directed the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government to apprise it of the steps taken following the attack on the junior doctors at a city hospital on Monday night

Representational Picture


On June 14. 2019, the Calcutta High Court refused to pass any interim order on the strike by junior doctors at state-run hospitals in protest against the attack on two of their colleagues by family members of a patient. A division bench comprising Chief Justice TBN Radhakrishnan and Justice Suvra Ghosh asked the state government to persuade the striking doctors to resume work and provide usual services to patients.

The court also directed the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government to apprise it of the steps taken following the attack on the junior doctors at a city hospital on Monday night. The Chief Justice, during the hearing of a Public Interest Litigation (PIL), reminded the striking doctors of the 'Hippocratic Oath' they take to ensure the welfare of all patients. The bench fixed June 21 for further hearing of the petition.

Junior doctors across all state-run hospitals in West Bengal have called for a strike, demanding adequate security in medical colleges and hospitals, after two of their colleagues were brutally beaten up at NRS Medical College and Hospital in the city.
Emergency wards, outdoor facilities, pathological units of many state-run medical colleges and hospitals and a number of private medical facilities in the state have remained closed over the past three days in the wake of the protest.

On the other hand, health services in West Bengal's state-run hospitals on Friday remained disrupted as protesting doctors continued their strike despite repeated requests by patients' families to start treatment. The junior doctors at the NRS Medical College and Hospital - the epicentre of the protests - continued their sit-in. However, hospital gates were opened enabling normalcy of emergency services. The cease work at the outpatient departments (OPDs) continued in most of the state-run hospitals.

"Please resume the work and do not make the dialysis patients and pregnant women suffer as they are not at fault. I apologise on behalf of all the patients of Bengal," a patient's kin requested NRS medicos with folded hands. He pleaded the doctors to understand, saying poor people would suffer without treatment. Read the full story here.

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