THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Resident doctors, who boycotted work, including emergency services, on Friday, have decided to continue their protest despite efforts from Health Minister Veena George to pacify them.
The protest — launched against the government’s failure to agree to their demands like urging the Centre to speed up NEET-PG allotment and reinstate the 4% annual salary hike of resident doctors — affected emergency services in all medical college hospitals (MCHs) in the state. The doctors only performed Covid duties. The state executive committee of the Kerala Medical Post Graduate Association said Veena was yet to agree to its demand for a meeting.
The Thiruvananthapuram MCH’s decision to evict protesting resident doctors from hostels became the rallying point for the protesters to intensify the strike. The evicted residents held a protest meet on major college campuses which helped in building a consensus to intensify the protest.
While the MCH maintained that the move was based on the directions from Veena’s office during a video conference, the minister said she had given no such instruction. Later, the directives issued by the college principals were withdrawn and the evictees were allowed to return to hostels.