Doctors across India protest rape and murder of medic in Kolkata

Thousands of doctors halt services across the country after 31-year-old trainee medic is found dead in a hospital.

Hospital services have been disrupted in several Indian cities after a doctors’ protest spread nationwide following the rape and murder of a trainee medic in the city of Kolkata, authorities and media reports said.

Thousands of doctors marched on Monday in Kolkata, capital of West Bengal state, and other cities in the state to denounce the killing at a government-run hospital, demanding justice for the victim and better security measures.

The body of the 31-year-old trainee doctor was found dead inside the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata on Friday. An autopsy showed she was raped before being killed.

A police volunteer was subsequently arrested in connection with the crime.

Protests spread to other parts of India on Tuesday, with more than 8,000 government doctors in the western Maharashtra state, home to the financial capital of Mumbai, halting work in all hospital departments except emergency services, local media reports said.

The Federation of Resident Doctors Association had called for nationwide halting of elective services in hospitals starting Monday.

Emergency services stayed suspended on Tuesday in almost all the government-run medical college hospitals in Kolkata, state official NS Nigam told the Reuters news agency, adding that the government was assessing the effect on health services.

In the national capital, New Delhi, junior doctors wearing white coats held posters that read, “Doctors are not punching bags,” as they sat in protest outside a large government hospital.

Similar protests in cities such as Lucknow, capital of the most populous state of Uttar Pradesh, and in the