Doctors of North Delhi Municipal Corporation hospitals on indefinite strike, services affected

Services at North Delhi Municipal Corporation-run hospitals were affected as doctors continued their agitation on Wednesday over pending salaries, despite the civic body saying "all dues have been cleared".

Services at North Delhi Municipal Corporation-run hospitals were affected as doctors continued their agitation on Wednesday over pending salaries, despite the civic body saying "all dues have been cleared". Senior doctors belonging to the Municipal Corporation Doctors' Association (MCDA) had gone on casual leave en masse over their pending salaries on Monday and begun an indefinite strike on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, the strike continued despite appeals from North Delhi Mayor Jai Prakash to return to work as patient services were getting affected. On Tuesday afternoon, the mayor had held a press conference with his counterparts from the two other corporations, and later in a statement claimed that the "NDMC today cleared the due salaries of doctors up to September; of safai karamcharis and domestic breeding checkers up to August this year, and of nurses up to July, and of health workers up to June".

MCDA general secretary Maruti Sinha on Tuesday had said, "Salaries have not been credited, so our indefinite strike is still on". Residents doctors of Hindu Rao Hospital have been agitating over their pending salaries since last week of September and by turns, five of their colleges have been sitting on a relay hunger strike for the past few days.

On Wednesday, they also continued to protest.  North Delhi Mayor Prakash and NDMC Standing Committee chairman Chhail Bihari Goswami would go to Hindu Rao Hospital to meet the protesting doctors and medical staff to urge them to call off their strike, a civic official said. MCDA, an association of senior permanent doctors of the civic hospitals, was established in 1974, and has about 1,200 members. It also includes doctors from hospitals run by other two municipal corporations -- South Delhi and East Delhi.

About 250 doctors are under the RDA of Hindu Rao Hospital, which is leading the resident doctors agitation. Other major hospitals under the North Corporation, include Kasturba Hospital, Rajen Babu Tuberculosis Hospital, Mrs Girdhari Lal Maternity Hospital.

As these doctors did not attend to patients, many patients at Hindu Rao Hospital and other facilities had to go to other hospitals. Authorities may have taken services of contractual doctors, Sinha said.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)