Thousands of Indian junior doctors on Monday refused to end protests over the rape and murder of a fellow medic, disrupting hospital services nearly a week after they launched a nationwide action demanding a safer workplace and swift criminal probe.
Doctors across the country have held protests and declined to see non-emergency patients following the killing on August 9th of the 31-year-old medic, who police say was raped and murdered at a hospital in the eastern city of Kolkata where she was a trainee.
A police volunteer has been arrested and charged with the crime. Women activists say the incident has highlighted how women in India continue to suffer from sexual violence despite tougher laws brought in after the 2012 gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old student on a moving bus in New Delhi.
India introduced sweeping changes to the criminal justice system, including tougher sentences, after that attack, but campaigners say little has changed and not enough has been done to deter violence against women.
The government has urged doctors to return to duty while it sets up a committee to suggest measures to improve protection for healthcare professionals.
“Our indefinite cease-work and sit-in will continue till our demands are met,” said Dr Aniket Mahata, a spokesman for protesting junior doctors at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, where the incident happened.
In solidarity with the doctors, thousands of supporters of West Bengal state’s two biggest football clubs marched on the streets of Kolkata on Sunday evening chanting “We want justice”.
Groups representing junior doctors in neighbouring Odisha state, the capital New Delhi, and in the western state of Gujarat have also said their protests would continue.
Gita Gopinath, deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund, told India’s Business Standard daily that workplace safety was important to raise the country’s female labour force participation rate, which was 37 per cent in the 2022-23 financial year.
“One cannot raise that [female participation] without ensuring safety at the workplace and safety of women in getting to the workplace. That is absolutely critical,” Ms Gopinath said on Monday.
The Indian Medical Association, a doctors’ union that held a 24-hour strike which ended on Sunday morning, told prime minister Narendra Modi in a letter that, as 60 per cent of India’s doctors were women, he needed to intervene to ensure hospital staff were protected by security protocols akin to those at airports. – Reuters
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2024