Protests escalated over the rape and murder of an Indian doctor By Reuters
(Modifies the title to add the deprecated word 'day')
By Subrata Nag Choudhury and Jatindra
KOLKATA (Reuters) – Junior doctors at many Indian hospitals did not work on Sunday to demand swift justice for a colleague who was raped and then killed, despite the end of a 24-hour strike called by the country's largest doctors' union.
Doctors across the country staged protests, candlelight marches and refused to see non-emergency patients last week after a 31-year-old asthma student was killed in the early hours of August 9 in the eastern city of Kolkata.
Women's activists say that the incident that happened at the British RG Kar Medical College and Hospital has highlighted how women in India continue to suffer despite strict laws following the rape and murder of a 23-year-old student on a bus in Delhi. 2012.
“My daughter has gone but millions of sons and daughters have gone with me,” the deceased's father, who cannot be named under Indian law, told the media on Saturday night, referring to the protesting doctors. “This has given me a lot of energy and I feel that we will gain something from it.”
India introduced sweeping reforms to its criminal justice system, including tougher sentences, after the 2012 attacks, but campaigners say little has changed and not enough has been done to curb violence against women.
The Indian Medical Association, whose strike ended at 6 a.m. (0030 GMT) on Sunday, told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that since 60% of India's doctors are women, he needs to intervene to ensure that hospital workers are protected by the same safety rules as those in hospitals. airports.
“All health workers deserve peace, safety and security at work,” the letter to Modi read.
'CAN STOP EMERGENCY SERVICES'
The government has urged doctors to return to work to treat rising cases of dengue and malaria while setting up a committee to suggest ways to improve the protection of health workers.
Many doctors have resumed their normal duties, IMA officials said, although Sunday is usually a holiday for non-emergency cases.
“Doctors have returned to their routine,” said Dr. Madan Mohan Paliwal, head of the IMA in the most populous state, Uttar Pradesh. “The next step will be decided if the government does not take strong measures to protect doctors… and in this case we can stop paramedics as well.”
But the All India Residents and Junior Doctors' Joint Action Forum said on Saturday it would continue with a “nationwide work stoppage” with a 72-hour deadline for authorities to conduct a thorough investigation and make arrests.
Dr. Prabhas Ranjan Tripathy, who is the additional medical director of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in the eastern city of Bhubaneswar, said junior doctors and trainees had not started work.
“The demonstrations are still there today,” he told Reuters. “There is a lot of pressure on others because the strength of the workers is decreasing.
RG Kar Hospital has been rocked by agitations and rallies for over a week. Police have banned gatherings of five or more people to protest for a week starting Sunday and have deployed armed police.
The ban on meetings, protests and movement of people was supposed to prevent “breach of peace, disturbance of public peace”, Kolkata Police Commissioner Vineet Goyal said in an order.
Reuters reporters did not see doctors in the area where they usually protest near the hospital gates on Sunday, as it was raining in the area.
