Doctors took to the streets across India on Wednesday calling for sweeping reforms to protect health workers after a female medical student was raped and murdered at a government-run hospital last week.
The attack came shortly after federal investigators arrived in the eastern city of Kolkata, capital of West Bengal state, where the incident occurred, following protesters’ demands for an investigation.
Federal forensic experts and medical personnel are due to visit the R G Kall Medical College and Hospital, where authorities found the body of the 31-year-old resident doctor at the seminar venue on Friday, state-run All India Radio reported.
Police said the woman’s body bore signs of sexual abuse and multiple injuries, and a suspect was arrested.
A wave of anger swept through Kolkata last week after doctors, long unhappy with working conditions in India’s ageing and overcrowded public hospitals, called a strike, halting elective treatments.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA), one of India’s largest doctors’ associations, said in 2021 that more than 75% of doctors in the country have faced some form of violence, mostly by patient caregivers.
The case also highlights India’s long-standing struggle to combat violence against women, despite having some of the toughest laws in the world.
Medical associations across the country have joined the movement, calling for a federal investigation and review of hospital safety procedures, with protesters saying some state laws have been largely ineffective and that federal legislation is needed.
Activists and medical professionals protested on Tuesday. Dibyangshu Sarkar / AFP – Getty Images
The Federation of Resident Doctor Associations, X Statement The company called off the strike after meeting Health Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda late Tuesday and said its key demands have already been met.
The committee drafting the law, which the federation is calling the Central Health Protection Act, is expected to meet within two weeks, the statement said.
Still, thousands of doctors continued to protest in solidarity, calling for the suspension of the Kolkata school principal and the swift implementation of protective legislation.
“This heinous crime reveals the shocking inadequacy of security within our hospital premises,” the Federation of All India Medical Associations said on Wednesday. Letter X.
Video footage taken in Kolkata showed doctors in white coats and stethoscopes shouting “We want justice” and holding banners.
Similar protests continued in other cities across India. Video from All India Radio showed staff at Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital in the Indian capital, New Delhi, shouting slogans and demanding the new law be passed.
Doctors are “being mistreated, trolled, sued and even beaten to death,” the IMA told Health Minister Nadda. Open Letter Tuesday. “Inhumane workloads and violence in the workplace are a reality.”
“This is not the first time that a young female doctor has been murdered,” he said, adding, “It will not be the last unless corrective action is taken.”
The State Medical Commission on Tuesday recommended that medical schools step up security measures, including video surveillance and increasing the number of security guards.
India’s National Crime Records Bureau recorded an average of 86 rape cases per day in 2022. Yet many women still do not report sexual crimes due to the stigma attached to being a victim in India’s deeply patriarchal society.
Following the rape and death of a young woman in New Delhi in 2013, prison terms for rapists were doubled to 20 years, and laws were also changed to criminalise acts such as stalking and voyeurism, and allow suspects aged 16 to be tried as adults.
