Protesting AIIMS doctors detained

The doctors were protesting the alleged delay in awarding degrees for the past three years, report Jaya Shroff and Sidhartha Roy.

More than 50 resident doctors of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) who had gone on an indefinite strike from Tuesday evening were detained by police. The doctors were protesting the alleged delay in awarding degrees for the past three years.

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Over 700 students have been waiting to get their MBBS degrees signed from the health minister for almost 10 months now. According to AIIMS spokesperson Professor Manoj Kumar Singh, Health Minister Ambumani Ramadoss had assured the AIIMS Director last week that he would sign the degrees at the earliest. Responding to which, the Registrar Dr. Sandeep Agarwal went to meet Ramadoss thrice in the last three days, but was not attended to.

“Most foreign Universities do not accept provisional certificates. The resident doctors who had applied to foreign universities are in a fix now as deadlines to a lot of European Univerities are nearing and if they fail to meet the deadlines, the applicants will lose a whole year,” said Dr. Harsh, President, RDA.

The strike began at 7 pm but the functioning of the emergency services and ICU will not be affected, Anil Sharma, General Secretary of Resident Doctors Association said. “More than 100 doctors who were protesting have been arrested and taken to the Parliament Street police station,” he said.