Bengal junior doctors end hunger strike after meeting with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee

KOLKATA: The junior doctors protesting over the RG Kar Medical College rape and murder case in Kolkata ended their hunger strike after a two-hour-long meeting with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at the state secretariat Nabanna on Monday night.

“…at the meeting with the Chief Minister, we got the opportunity to discuss many things and she also spoke to us about many things. We have got assurance of some directives, which she said we would get by 3 pm tomorrow (Tuesday)”, Sayantani Ghosh Hazra, a junior doctor, said.

Seventeen junior doctors participated in the meeting with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. The meeting was telecast live from the secretariat. Chief Minister Banerjee, for the past few days, had appealed to the doctors to withdraw the strike and come to the discussion table.

#WATCH | Kolkata | Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee via video conferencing meets and interacts with members of the West Bengal Junior Doctors’ Front over their various demands, at Nabanna pic.twitter.com/Qdq4kNIQIq

— ANI (@ANI) October 21, 2024

After junior doctors ended their indefinite hunger strike, they were taken to the hospital. Many of the junior doctors had to be hospitalised after their health deteriorated in the middle of the hunger strike.

Protests have erupted across West Bengal following the murder of the trainee doctor. The victim was found dead in the seminar hall of the college on August 9. The incident has sparked a political row between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the state government, with the BJP calling for the resignation of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.

Doctors across the country had expressed their solidarity with the junior doctors. On October 15, the Indian Medical Association announced that the IMA Junior Doctors Network across the nation will be fasting in solidarity with the West Bengal Junior Doctors Front. (ANI)