On Monday, the government doctors, nurses and other health workers wore black badges in protest against Lt Governor Kiran Bedi for allegedly ‘demeaning’ a senior doctor during her visit to the Directorate of Health on Saturday.
In a memorandum submitted to Director of Health, Dr S Mohan Kumar, by the Puducherry Government Medical Officers Association (PGMAO) on Monday, the president Dr K Sriram and general secretary Dr G Anbusenthil said that a senior doctor was questioned and demeaned by Kiran Bedi.
Governor in their premises which hurt the entire medical fraternity. The intimidating manner of handling a very senior officer of the health department in front of subordinates and staff of other departments and putting out a video disturbed them, they said.
Since February, the entire department is working in full swing, which was appreciated by the general public, political leaders and other department officials. “We are working on all days including Sundays and public holidays even at late hours and the untiring work was insulted by the LG,” they said.
In such an uncertain and unprecedented situation, her empathy would have been more welcome rather than authoritative behaviour, they said. The medical officers are presented with multiple supervisory hierarchies in which they are forced to work in a constant state of fear, which adversely affects their performance. Further, the field staff are forced to duplicate their work in soft copies, they said.
“For the benefit of the public of Puducherry, we have decided to work in the same manner as before as we understand the nature of the disease better. The cases are bound to increase and we are working towards addressing it and preventing it to our best ability,” they added.
