CHENNAI: In-service postgraduate students of medical colleges have staged a demonstration protesting the appointment of non-service doctors in the government medical colleges. The protest has delayed the counselling for more than four hours and the doctors dispersed after the Director of Medical Education (DME) challenged them to meet in court.
The Directorate of Medical Education called for applications on Friday to fill assistant professor vacancies and non-service candidates, who had just passed out of their PG course, were selected. Usually, these seats are given to in-service doctors who finished a five-year service in various hospitals across the State. Over 500 government in-service postgraduate students are passing out in next three months to fill the vacancies.
The protest was held at Health and Family Welfare Training Centre in Egmore, where the counselling took place. Hence, the counselling that should have started at around 10 am was pushed till 2 pm.
Later the students were asked to move out of the hall to held peace talks where the Director of the DME and the Director of Public Health told the students that they cannot cancel the ongoing counselling and that they are free to approach the court for remedy.
According to the doctors, the government promised to hold back the decision of appointing non-service fresh candidates in the vacant seats months ago. They added that this happened every year and every time they had to protest.
“This sudden walk-in interview conducted for the private doctors came as a shock to us, since we never expected this to happen,” said another doctor who added that a case has been filed and the hearing will be held on Tuesday.