Medicos' stir over quota intensifies

NEW DELHI: The medicos' anti-reservation stir gained momentum on Saturday with resident doctors joining students in striking work in the national capital and several other cities, causing hardship for thousands of patients at state-run hospitals.

The functioning of five government hospitals in Delhi, including the prestigious All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), was paralysed as resident doctors did not report for duty. Hundreds of patients and their kin were seen desperately looking for help.
The doctors and students at AIIMS and other government hospitals, who began a strike on Friday in response to a call from the Indian Medical Association (IMA), shouted slogans against Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh.

In Orissa, 1,200 house surgeons and junior doctors in hospitals attached to government medical colleges at Cuttack, Burla and Berhampur stopped work. Medical students of different colleges in Ahmedabad also began an indefinite strike.