The doctors, including the resident doctors, treated about 600 patients daily.
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This comes as Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has urged the doctors to call off the strike and attend to their respective duties.
The IMA, which has some 40,000 members in Maharashtra, had extended its support to the agitation on Wednesday.
“At Lady Hardinge Medical College the OPD card counters were shut immediately after the resident doctors went off their duties as part of mass casual leave”. Association spokesperson Dr Gagandeep Shergill said, “Even in Gurdaspur, a medical officer was manhandled by the security guard of a senior police official. Why shouldn’t we? If they do not agree to the request, the government will not sit back with folded hands”, he had added. “Doctors should be given a healthy environment at the hospitals”, Nadda said. We will set up an ex-DG level committee for security audit of all hospitals. People are also very aggressive. “We will hear the matter every fortnight and supervise the issue”, the judges said.
The doctors are planning to stand in solidarity with a resident doctor, who was brutally beaten up by the relatives of a deceased patient at Mumbai’s Sion Hospital.
“The court has directed to provide security in all hospitals by April 5”.
According to Mumbai Mirror, 53 doctors have been attacked over the past couple of years, but no action has been taken.
Though Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) did not extend support or endorse the protest by the doctors, it was involved in negotiations with the state government from day one. Among the nine hospitals across the state, these three will be the first ones to get armed guards.
“The incidents of assault on doctors is rising everyday”. The police arrested eight men for the assault and vandalism. More than four thousand doctors had gone on strike in the state. They took the day off yesterday in protest. There are talks about levying a hefty fine on doctors not wearing helmets with ISI mark on it. “Several times in the past we have been given assurances on our safety but nothing has happened”.
The Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (MARD) in its statement said that suspension notices were served on 370 resident doctors in Nagpur and 114 in Solapur.
Doctors have demanded strict implementation of the Maharashtra Medicare Service Persons and Medicare Service Institutions (Prevention of Violence and Damage of Property) Act, 2009.
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The doctors have demanded that hospitals be equipped with alarm systems. They also want only two passes to be given to relatives of patients, who should be allowed to visit only in defined hours.
