The government of Maharashtra on Tuesday provided details of measures taken for safety and security of doctors in government-run hospitals to prevent relatives of patients assaulting them.
The government of Maharashtra on Tuesday provided details of measures taken for safety and security of doctors in government-run hospitals to prevent relatives of patients assaulting them.
Advocate General (AG) Rohit Deo informed the division bench of Justice Abhay Oka and Justice Amjad Sayed that the government is mulling handing over responsibility of monitoring CCTV cameras installed in the hospital to the nearest police stations.
The court was informed that the CCTV cameras in hospitals would be connected to the nearest police stations. This would help policemen monitor the situation and take steps in case of emergency.
He further said that the government would deploy additional policemen in hospitals for security of doctors and in addition to that security guards would be recruited by Maharashtra State Security Corporation at hospitals. When the bench asked what power these security guards would have, advocate Deo said that like policemen, the security guards have powers to arrest any person who is in possession of arms or weapon while entering hospitals. Other measures include putting a restriction on the number of visitors entering the hospitals and the timing of their visit.
The court was hearing a public interest litigation filed by social activist Afaq Mandviya, through advocate Datta Mane challenging the strike undertaken by resident doctors affiliated to Maharashtra Association of Resident Doctors (Mard). Though the petition was filed quite a while ago, it was mentioned again before the court after the recent strike.
During the hearing, Mard had complained that despite previous court orders the government has not taken any security measures to protect them from physical assaults by relatives of ailing patients. Following this, the court had directed the government to immediately take steps to solve this issue.
On Tuesday the lawyer appearing for Mard pointed out that an incident had occurred in Gondia area of Nagpur in which a doctor was assaulted on June 18.
The AG said that this matter was currently being heard by the Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court. He also informed that a meeting of the panel, appointed to look into the grievances of Mard members, had been held recently.
