Indian doctors went on strike across the country on Saturday, escalating protests in response to the “barbaric” rape and murder of a colleague, which has sparked indignation over the long-standing issue of gender violence.
On August 9, the 31-year-old doctor’s bloodied body was discovered in a state-run hospital in Kolkata, eastern India, sparking violent protests across the country.
Doctors and other healthcare workers have led the way, but tens of thousands of ordinary Indians have also joined in the call for action.
Thousands of people in Kolkata attended a candlelight vigil until early Saturday morning.
“Hands that heal shouldn’t bleed,” said one homemade sign held by a demonstrator in the eastern city.
“Enough is enough,” another read at a physicians’ rally in the capital New Delhi.
The slain doctor was discovered in the teaching hospital’s lecture hall, indicating that she had gone there to relax after working a 36-hour shift.
An autopsy revealed sexual assault, and the victim’s parents filed a court petition claiming that their daughter had been gang-raped.
‘Struggle for justice’
Those in government hospitals across several states on Monday halted elective services “indefinitely”, with multiple medical unions in both government and private systems backing the strikes.
On Saturday morning, the Indian Medical Association (IMA) escalated protests with a 24-hour “nationwide withdrawal of services”, and the suspension of all non-essential procedures.
“We ask for the understanding and support of the nation in this struggle for justice for its doctors and daughters,” IMA chief R.V. Asokan said, in a statement ahead of the strike.
The IMA called the killing “barbaric”.
“The 36-hour duty shift that the victim was in and the lack of safe spaces to rest… warrant a thorough overhaul of the working and living conditions of the resident doctors,” IMA said in a statement.
Doctors are demanding the implementation of the Central Protection Act, a bill to protect healthcare workers from violence.
Members of the wider public have also marched in several cities this week, including at a candlelight midnight rally in Kolkata that coincided with the start of India’s Independence Day celebrations on Thursday.
Sexual violence against women is a widespread problem in India — an average of nearly 90 rapes a day were reported in 2022 in the country of 1.4 billion people.
For many, the gruesome nature of the hospital attack has invoked comparisons with the horrific 2012 gang rape and murder of a young woman on a Delhi bus.
That woman became a symbol of the socially conservative country’s failure to tackle sexual violence against women.
Her death sparked huge, and at times violent, demonstrations in Delhi and elsewhere.