KOLKATA: It was a major climb down for junior doctors at NRS Hospital on Sunday, who, after hours of meetings and debates at the U N Brahmachari Building on Saturday night finally decided to have a dialogue with the state at a venue chosen by chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
A little before midnight on Saturday, junior doctors came out with a statement claiming they were ready for the talk, but were indecisive about the venue. The doctors, who sympathized with the patients who weren’t receiving treatment, said they were ready to start a dialogue with the state but refused to accept the “closed-door meeting” suggested by the CM. Banerjee had appealed to agitating doctors to join the negotiating table at Nabanna.
During that time, different views started coming up from several sections of the protesters inside the U N Brahmachari Building. The pressure to soften their stand and find a middle ground was already mounting and a section of the doctors suggested holding the talk in presence of Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi. A big section of the agitating doctors, however, decided to wait till Sunday morning to decide on the venue at a general body meeting.
Meanwhile, fears of a fresh attack gripped a section of the students at NRS Hospital as rumours started spreading after photographs of a group of men jostling outside the hospital’s main gate was shared across social networking platforms. “Some of the students were scared, but nothing untoward happened on Saturday night,” a junior doctor said.
During that time, a voice clip, allegedly of BJP leader Bharati Ghosh, went viral on social media where the caller suggested a negotiation at the Raj Bhavan in presence of the media. The caller also suggested the chief minister’s offer to initiate talks at Raj Bhavan can be helpful in breaking the impasse. Ghosh, however, said the voice in the clip was not hers and she later lodged a complaint with the Kolkata Police and the CID.
The general body meeting started at 11am on Sunday in the Academic Building hall where students started placing their views. A section of them agreed to hold the dialogue at Nabanna to end the impasse. Another section insisted on holding the meeting at Raj Bhavan. A third section, however, was in favour of holding the dialogue at the medical college itself.
By 3. 30pm, the doctors managed to reach a unanimous decision — to meet at a place chosen by Banerjee.
