Doctors strike in Bengal

Last January my MAUSA (husband of  mom's sister) was declared dead by doctors of a major private hospital in Bhopal in India. He was then transferred to the morgue. Before he was about to be pushed into the cold storage drawer, the attendants carrying him saw some involuntary movements of his eyelids, legs and arms. They were terrified enough to run away screaming BHOOT BHOOT (Ghost, Ghost). One of them peed on spot, with wet stream rushing down his Khaki pants, as seen by those who rushed to the morgue on hearing the commotion. 

Six months down the road it is middle of June now and Mausa who was declared dead in January is still alive. If this can happen to a person whose son is a top ranking I*S official of Madhya Pradesh cadre, imagine the plight of commoners like you and me. The incident was enough for my Cousin to brand the highly paid doctors who declared his living father dead as Quacks rather than Doctors - more of a curse and shame to their Hippocratic oath.

That doesn't mean that all doctors in India are quacks. There are excellent doctors who are doing a commendable job, often in adverse and demanding circumstances. Yet this is not the only horror story of utter incompetence and irresponsibly about doctors back home. Medical study is not exact science. Mistakes are made. Though to err is human, forgive is can't be Divine in matters of health, life and death as the victims and their near and dear ones vent their frustrations over the doctors. It takes a few bad Apples to hurt the image of the greater majority. You add a spoon of shit to a barrel of wine, no one will imbibe that wine.

With this backdrop comes the Doctors strike in West Bengal. The medicos are protesting as some of them were beaten by public for alleged negligence of duty. But, however bad a doctor may be one has no rights to take law into own hand in a Civil society. They might be wrong, but they were wronged when they were beaten.

All this is happening in a state which prides as the land of BHADRALOKs (gentlemen) where ironically political violence and public taking laws into their own hands is as old as the history of the state being carved out from the greater Bengal post independence. The doctors do have rights to peaceful protest, but in a state where politics and violence goes along with protests, it is rarely peaceful.

Now that the concocted miasma of politics and protest is slowly sliding into a messy territory, no one knows how this is going to end - especially Mamata Didi, the person at the helm of affairs is blaming everything from the Docs to BJP, but not herself. There goes an African proverb - When two Elephants make love or war, it's the grass which suffers. As the people of Bengal suffer - hope the crisis which started with violence ends in a peaceful manner.