In India, 3,000 junior doctors who had resigned last week during the countrys ongoing COVID-19 calamity are back on their job after attaining an agreement with the state government for a hike in their pay.

The junior doctors announced on Twitter that the state government has promised to fulfil their demands, including an increase in stipends. Initially, the doctors from Madhya Pradesh (MP) demanded their stipends to be increased by 24%, however after negotiations, they settled for a 17% hike.

The triumph marks the first increase in pay junior doctors have received in 3 years, even though the earlier promises made by the government.

The strike had begun on 31st May. After four days, a court ordered the doctors to be back to work, but 3,000 of them resigned instead. After having a meeting with the medical education minister of the state on Sunday evening, the junior doctors out an end to their strike on 7th June.

According to the Junior and Senior Resident Doctors Association of MP (RDAMP), they had received verbal assurances for their other demands, which included security for doctors in hospital premises (due to increasing assaults on doctors treating COVID patients), and reserving hospital beds for doctors and their families in ICU and COVID wards.

The doctors also wanted to be released from the obligation of completing a 1-year "rural bond. As India’s COVID outbreak worsened, junior doctors were asked to staff its front line seniors. Many doctors-in-training are traumatized by an unexpected reel to critical care during this pandemic.

A day after their strike started, a government official had sent the names of 468 postgraduate strikers to Madhya Pradesh Medical Science University in Jabalpur. The university administration had cancelled these students enrolments, barring them from giving their final exams.

On 3rd June, public interest litigation was then filed in the High Court of MP, considering the strike to be illegal. The court ordered the doctors to return back to work within 24 hours, instead 3,000 doctors who worked at six government medical organizationsin the state resigned.

The activists then met with the medical education minister of MP on Sunday evening, and out an end to their strike the next day and requested that all the legal actions taken against the junior doctors be dropped.

Source: Medpage Today