The law’s long arm seems to have been amputated in Rabri Devi’s Bihar. How else can one explain the continued harassment of doctors by what appears to be an organised mafia operating in the state. This had even prompted the Patna High Court to comment earlier this year on the “total anarchy [that] prevails in the state”, an indictment that fell on deaf ears. The court was hearing a memorandum submitted by the Bihar chapter of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) that had stated that at least 33 doctors had been kidnapped in the state in the last decade, four doctors murdered in the last year, and most of them received extortion threats.
Seen against this backdrop, the just-concluded five-day-long strike called by the state’s doctors, following yet another murder of a colleague (who refused to pay Rs 5 lakh to extortionists) and the abduction of a second doctor, is a desperate bid to goad the government into action. This may be an unhealthy trend that is very difficult to condone, as it puts at risk the lives of hundreds of patients due to lack of immediate medical attention. At the same time, should the lives of these same ‘life-givers’ not be considered worth protecting?
The RJD government has failed in its primary duty of safeguarding the lives of its people. Making the case against it worse is its total apathy for the plight of the doctors, which seems to suggest that there might be something to the ‘theory’ of a nexus between the State and the criminals. Criminalisation of everything under the sun in Bihar — from politics to education — has already resulted in the disenchantment — and flight — of the professional class. If the government loses any more time in addressing the concerns of the doctors, an ailing state might soon witness its sick left to fend for themselves.