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Quota strike: Patients bear brunt
Published on Sat, May 13, 2006 at 13:19, Updated on Sat, May 13, 2006 at 18:54 in India section
Tags: Medical Students, Arjun Singh , New Delhi
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New Delhi: Even as hundreds of agitating medical students fought pitched street battle with Delhi police on Saturday, ailing patients in various Delhi hospitals bore the brunt.
With resident doctors calling for a 24-hour shutdown against the proposed quota for Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in institutes of higher learning, there was nobody to attend to the patients.
The worst-hit hospitals were the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Safdurjang, Maulana Azad, Lok Nayak hospital and Guru Teg Bahadur hospital.
"There are no doctors even in the emergency room. We have come from far. What will we do now? If the government doesn't listen to us who will?" said an ailing patient outside the general ward at AIIMS hospital.
According to the sources, normally there are 12-15 resident doctors in the general ward.
However, Saturday being a holiday, the OPD was closed and no resident doctor was available even in the emergency ward.
However, a few senior faculty members were present in the hospital and were attending to the patients on a priority basis.
Condemening use of force by police against "peacefully demonstrating" medical students the Indian Medical Association had asked the doctors' associations of different medical colleges and affiliated hospitals in Delhi to go on a 24-hour strike with immediate effect.
Water cannons and tear gas were used on hundreds of medical students and resident doctors. Nearly 419 medical students were detained.
"The IMA is shocked to see how police force brutally handled a peaceful demonstration rally by Delhi medical students. Over 300 medial students have been arrested and lodged in different police stations," said IMA national president Sanjiv Malik.
Though no fresh arrests have been made, police have registered a case of rioting and unlawful assembly in prosecution of a common objective under section 147 and 149 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The doctors' association has now called for a "total medical bandh" in the Capital next Monday.
It has threatened that if the government fails to give a "patient hearing" to medical students who are agitating against reservation in elite institutions and failed to consider IMA's views on the matter, there would be a nationwide medical bandh on May 25.
"The IMA has already expressed its views that we should not be dividing the Indian society based on casteism any longer. Reservation based on casteism would only divide the society further based on castes," Malik said.
Alleging that move to extend quota system to higher education and professional learning was a retrograde step based on politics of vote bank, he said it would do away with merit.
Assuring full support to the agitating medical students, Malik said that the medical association was committed to the fact that downtrodden and under-privileged sections of the society need to be given augmented facilities to ensure they get a level playing field.
"However, the criteria needs to be based on economic inequalities rather than casteism," he added.
"The rest of the medial colleges will join the strike on Monday," he said claiming medical services would continue to remain affected by this bandh.
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