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Indian doctors have launched a nationwide strike, intensifying protests over the rape and murder of a colleague in the West Bengal city of Kolkata. The Indian Medical Association (IMA), the country’s largest doctors’ body, said all non-essential hospital services across the country would be closed on Saturday. The BBC wrote.
The IMA described last week’s killings as a “barbaric crime committed due to lack of safe spaces for women” and called on the country to support its “struggle for justice”.
Protests against the attack and calls for better protection for women have intensified in recent days after a group vandalized the hospital where the attack took place.
Emergency and rescue services will continue to operate and the strike will last for 24 hours, the IMA statement said.
RV Asokan, the association’s president, told the BBC that doctors had been subjected to and protesting violence for years, but this incident was “qualitatively different”. If such a crime had happened at a medical college in a big city, he said, it would have shown that “doctors everywhere are not safe”.
Earlier this week, doctors at some public hospitals announced an indefinite suspension of elective surgeries.
The IMA also issued a list of demands, including strengthening laws to better protect medical staff from violence, improving hospital security and creating safe recreational facilities. The document called for a “thorough and professional investigation” into the murder, bringing those involved in the vandalism to justice and paying compensation to the woman’s family.
The rape of a 31-year-old female intern shocked the whole country.
According to reports, her half-naked body was found with multiple injuries while she was taking a rest in the seminar hall of RG Kar Medical College last week.
A volunteer working at the hospital was arrested in connection with the crime and the case has been handed over from local police to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) amid criticism for lack of progress.
Following the woman’s death, more reports of rape made headlines in India, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi declaring that “heinous acts against women must be punished harshly and swiftly”.
The Environmental Protection Agency held a protest in Delhi. The demonstrators also called for improved safety in hospitals and better laws to protect medical staff.
The woman’s rape and murder has triggered a political blame game in West Bengal, with the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accusing the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) of orchestrating the attack.
The TMC has denied the charges and accused “political outsiders” of inciting the violence.Tens of thousands of women in West Bengal took part in a “Take Back the Night” march on Wednesday night, demanding to “live independently, freely and without fear”.
While the protest was largely peaceful, clashes broke out between police and a small group of unidentified men who stormed the crime scene, RG Kar Hospital, and ransacked the emergency room. So far, at least 25 people have been arrested in connection with the incident.
Protests also took place in many other cities across India, including Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Pune.
“It looks like hope is returning,” one demonstrator, Sumita Dutta, told AFP as thousands marched through the streets of Kolkata on Friday.
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