NEW DELHI, 1 June 2006 — Resident doctors across India yesterday ended a 19-day strike against affirmative action for lower-castes, hours after the Supreme Court ordered them back to work, sources said.
Resident doctors at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences had called off their strike as had doctors at other hospitals in New Delhi and several Indian cities, local TV stations reported, citing protest organizers.
The court said earlier the doctors would face action if they carried on with the strike, which had crippled services at many state-run hospitals across India.
“Respecting the court’s order, doctors and interns have decided to call off the strike with immediate effect,” a doctor from the New Delhi-based All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), said.
A strike by doctors and students at AIIMS had sparked a nationwide campaign leaving hundreds of patients wearily waiting for day-to-day services to resume.
Doctors not taking part in the strikes kept emergency rooms up and running.
Yesterday, a few patients could be seen outside AIIMS.
Some slept with children on sidewalks patrolled by riot police. Nearby, doctors wearing black cloths in a sign of protest listened to nationalist songs.
Along with the striking doctors, tens of thousands of medical students and young software programs, engineers and bankers have protested the plan to increase the number of places reserved for low-caste Hindus and ethnic minorities in colleges and certain professions.
The doctors had earlier defied repeated calls from the court and officials, among them Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, to end the strike.
But with the doctors defiant and medical care suffering, the court yesterday ordered physicians back to work within three days, the Press Trust of India news agency reported. The court asked the government not to take punitive action against them if they complied.
The ruling also appeared to put on hold government plans to fire striking doctors and call in army and railway doctors to support the stalled services.
Judges will continue to hear petitions for and against the affirmative action program.
Arnab Pal, a protest organizer at AIIMS, had said doctors’ groups were concerned about patients losing out on care, pointing out that he and his colleagues had treated some 800 patients a day at a makeshift clinic since the strike began. On routine days, the hospital treats 8,000 people.
“We are mindful of the effect on the people, and we want their troubles to end as soon as possible,” Pal said before the end of the strike was announced.
But he insisted the situation was “the fault of the government,” which he said “has been insensitive to our demands.” The government’s plan would increase the quota for low-caste students in state-funded medical, engineering and other professional colleges from 22.5 percent to 49.5 percent.
Backers say the policy would help undo centuries of oppression and discrimination. Hinduism divides people into castes and, while the system has been officially outlawed, discrimination remains common.
Critics say the lower castes should be strengthened through education rather than an increase in the number of study and work opportunities, because many jobs and school spots already reserved for low castes remain empty.
The debate mattered little to Dinesh Chandra Saxena, 45, who traveled from the Himalayan foothills for urgent laser surgery to treat a ruptured vein in his eye, and possible paralysis in his right arm.
Staying with relatives in a New Delhi suburb, “We leave our home at 7:30 in the morning, and wait here until the evening. There are no doctors,” said his wife, Seema Saxena. — Additional input from agencies.
