RG Kar case: ‘Written deadline’ rider to junior doctors' 'complete cease-work' call

 The medics said on Sunday that most of the government’s assurances on security at teaching hospitals were yet to be met

Subhajoy Roy, TT, Calcutta, 30.09.24 : Junior doctors at government medical colleges, who have threatened to resume their “complete cease-work” from Monday evening, have said they are ready to reconsider if the administration gives a written assurance and a deadline by Monday afternoon for the implementation of their demands.

The medics said on Sunday that most of the government’s assurances on security at teaching hospitals were yet to be met.

“If the state government gives us a written assurance about our demands and sets a deadline for their completion, we will reconsider going on a complete cease-work from Monday evening,” Debashis Halder, senior resident at Medical College Kolkata and one of the faces of the doctors’ protest, told The Telegraph.

“The chief secretary issued a set of directives about increasing safety and security in medical colleges, but none of these have been met yet.”

Halder added: “We can only see some work relating to the installation of some CCTVs at a few medical colleges. Work to set up duty rooms has begun at a handful of colleges. But in most medical colleges, even this work has not started.”

Work has not even begun on the other promises, such as creating a system that would show real-time bed availability at each teaching hospital, the junior doctors said.

A complete cease-work is already under way since Friday night at the College of Medicine and Sagore Dutta Hospital in Kamarhati, on Calcutta’s northern fringes, after some junior doctors were allegedly assaulted and threatened by relatives of a 36-year-old woman who died at the hospital.

The woman’s family alleged she had died of negligence, without treatment.

“We have been saying throughout that doctor safety is also linked to proper patient services. The woman who died at Sagore Dutta Hospital needed a critical care bed, but none was available at the hospital at the time,” Halder said. “If patients’ families know the bed status, they can plan accordingly. During Covid, real-time bed availability was being displayed, which shows it is possible to run such a system.”

Junior doctors across Bengal’s medical colleges had staged a 42-day cease-work from August 9 following the rape and murder of a postgraduate trainee at RG Kar Hospital. They resumed “essential services”, such as emergency and critical care, from September 21.

On Saturday night, the West Bengal Junior Doctors’ Front announced they would again start a “complete cease-work” from Monday evening, hours after the Supreme Court hears the RG Kar case.

A junior doctor had said on Saturday the medics wanted to see what the state government tells the Supreme Court at Monday’s hearing about the measures taken to increase safety on medical college campuses.

On September 19, a day after a meeting with junior doctors, chief secretary Manoj Pant had issued directives to the health secretary saying all healthcare facilities should have on-duty rooms, washrooms, CCTVs and drinking water facilities.

The directives also stipulated measures such as a “panic call button alarm system”, a “centralised referral system” and a “centrally monitored real-time bed availability information system” -- all to be implemented as early as possible.

But the junior doctors alleged there had been no progress on these systems.

Aniket Mahato, a postgraduate trainee at RG Kar, rued the absence of even an assurance on ending the “reign of terror” at medical colleges.

“We demanded that the state set up a central inquiry committee and colleges set up their own inquiry committees to probe allegations of intimidation against some junior doctors, but there has been no word on this demand yet. This too is important in creating an atmosphere free of fear at the medical colleges,” Mahato said.

He said that about a fortnight had passed since the Supreme Court last heard the RG Kar matter, and 10 days since the chief secretary issued his directives, but the state government had done very little during this time.

“We are only hearing assurances; we want some visible changes that will show that the government has a positive intent,” Mahato said.

This newspaper had on Sunday quoted government officials as saying that the installation of infrastructure at teaching and other hospitals for the security of doctors and other healthcare staff would be completed by October-end.

They had added that progress had been slow at RG Kar because to start work, the state needed permission from the CBI, which is investigating the rape-murder and financial irregularities at the institution.