Hyderabad, December 3
Majlis legislator Afsar Khan, who had led the attack on Bangladeshi novelist Taslima Nasreen here three months ago, is again caught in the eye of a storm. This time over assaulting doctors at a government children’s hospital.
Khan, who represents the Karwan constituency in the city, and his supporters allegedly beat up doctors at Niloufer Children’s Hospital yesterday following altercation over delay in providing treatment to a girl. The ‘controversial’ legislator, along with his followers,
allegedly abused doctors and then manhandled them. Following the incident, over 250 junior doctors went on strike and have been staging a sit-in on the road since last night, demanding arrest under non-bailable charges and suspension of the MLA.
At least eight children lost their lives since last night as the medical services were thrown out of gear following the strike.
Raising slogans, the medicos squatted on the road leading to the hospital and refused to budge from their position. Expressing solidarity with them, the government doctors’ association announced that it would strike work across the state tomorrow.
In a bid to end the stand-off, the government announced a CID probe into the incident and offered to increase police security at all hospitals to prevent recurrence of such incidents.
A two-member team of ministers, G. Aruna Kumari and Mukesh Goud, held two rounds of talks with striking doctors but failed to end the impasse. According to doctors, the trouble started yesterday when an MIM activist and MLA’s relative
Junaid Khan admitted his one-year-old daughter as she was suffering from respiratory problem. Angry over the alleged delay in treatment, Junaid and his relatives manhandled duty staff and ransacked furniture before taking away the girl and admitting her in a private hospital.
On learning about the incident, the legislator went to the hospital along with a large number of supporters and entered into a heated argument with doctors.
The MLA wanted them to withdraw their case against Junaid.
When doctors refused to oblige, he and his supporters abused them and reportedly manhandled them. Khan was later arrested for assault, criminal intimidation but released on bail soon.
