Prayagraj: Commuters including officegoers and passengers heaved a major sigh of relief after the lawyers, protesting and staging a sit-in near Eklavya crossing for the past two days, on Friday called off their agitation, allowing normal vehicular movement to resume on the city’s busiest route.The demonstration, which caused major traffic jams on city streets and closure of the high court flyover on Wednesday and Thursday, was held following clashes between attendants of a woman lawyer and medicos at SRN hospital campus on Wednesday morning.Moreover, the resident doctors too have called off their protest and returned to their duties at SRN hospital on Friday afternoon. With doctors having resumed their duty, patients from city and neighbouring districts were also relieved.Meanwhile, the principal of MLN Medical College, Dr VK Pandey has suspended 20 resident doctors of surgery unit-II and orthopaedic unit-II of SRN hospital on the charges of dereliction of duties.The principal acted upon the probe committee’s report and suspended the resident doctors in connection with Wednesday incident.As the lawyers received information about the suspension of 20 resident doctors, they then decided to call off their agitation and sit-in. The lawyers were demanding action against the resident doctors and hospital staff accusing them of thrashing the women lawyers.Senior lawyer and ex-HCBA vice president, Vishnu Kumar Pandey told TOI, “Lawyers have called off their agitation after the authorities of MLN Medical College suspended the resident doctors.” He added, “Lawyers had been demanding action against the errant hospital doctors and staff who were accused of misbehaving with a woman lawyer patient and assaulting a woman lawyer”.Meanwhile, members associated with the Medical Teachers Association (MTA) of the MLN Medical College, Prayagraj, have decided to call off the strike of junior doctors in view of persisting heatwave and problems of patients.MTA secretary, Dr Santosh Singh told TOI, “All junior doctors have resumed their duties and all medical facilities are running smoothly.”He, however, said that junior doctors are the backbone of the medical family and members of the MTA would not tolerate any single sided and inappropriate action against junior doctors by the police and administration in connection with the Wednesday incident. He also made it clear that MTA would not tolerate harassment of junior and resident doctors and would be taking concrete steps in their support. Doctors have also demanded an impartial and fair probe into the incident.It may be recalled that the tussle between doctors and lawyers that started after clashes between attendants of a woman lawyer patient and the medicos at the SRN hospital continued on Wednesday and Thursday, with neither of two sides ready to back down despite mediation attempts by district authorities. While junior doctors boycotted the work at SRN hospital, lawyers were staging a protest and sit-in near Eklavya crossing, forcing police authorities to suspend vehicular movement on the high court flyover.
