West Bengal doctors' protest: State panel gets plaints of 'threat culture'

The health department in West Bengal has received numerous complaints from students regarding the ongoing threat culture and irregularities in the examination system in several government hospitals and medical colleges following the RG Kar incident a senior official said to PTI on ThursdayAll complaints were sent to the grievance redressal committee formed by the state government on Tuesday evening after the West Bengal doctors protests The junior doctors are currently on a total cease workFor the past few days we have received many complaints regarding an alleged threat culture a culture of intimidation and anomalies in the examination system in medical colleges We dont have the exact compiled figures but we have forwarded all the complaints to the statelevel grievance redressal committee the health department official told PTI on the condition of anonymityAccording to PTI another official claimed that complaints have come from six of the 25 staterun medical colleges and hospitalsThe complaints have been pouring in since late last month after the junior doctors partially resumed duties Some complaints were directly sent to the state health secretary and some to the state health department headquarters Several others were also to the Director of Health Services the official said to PTIWe have addressed some complaints and required action was taken We have now compiled a list of all complaints and sent it to the redressal committee he saidAccording to officials 40 medics were suspended for a period of six months and allowed on campus only for exams at the College of Medicine and JNM HospitalOfficials report that after being accused of threatening other students 40 medics from the College of Medicine and JNM Hospital in the Nadia region were suspended for six months and were only permitted on campus for examsFive North Bengal Medical College student doctors were punished for six months for suspected highhandedness and malpractices after protests by junior doctorsThe West Bengal doctors protest began after the rape and murder of a female medic at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata on August 9 The junior doctors had partially returned to duties on September 21 after a 42day protest However alleging that the state government did not fulfill its promises the West Bengal doctors protest resumed on TuesdayWe have been alleging from the beginning that there is deeprooted corruption in the state health department and medical colleges This corruption must be rooted out Our agitation has only given hope to junior doctors and resident doctors to raise their voices against the corruption said Aniket Mahato a medic to PTIAdditionally to demand immediate justice for the deceased doctor the protesting medics sketched a broader list of grievances Their nine demands include hiring permanent female police personnel increasing police security in hospitals and the removal of the states health secretaryThe doctors also asked for the immediate filling of all vacant posts for doctors nurses and healthcare workers as well as hospitals to implement a digital bed vacancy monitoring system PTI reportedWith inputs from PTI