Team Herald
PONDA: The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has declared a 12-hour all India strike on Saturday to oppose passing of the National Medical Commission Bill 2017 by the Parliament.
The strike will be from 6 am to 6 pm. However, it is restricted to only non-emergency medical services and all emergency services will be offered.
Addressing the media here on Friday, IMA-Goa unit President Ajay Pednekar informed that IMA-Goa unit members will join the strike.
Dr Pednekar claimed that the National Medical Commission Bill 2017 is anti-people and anti-medical profession.
He informed that the central working committee of IMA, after threadbare discussions on all the dimensions and impact of Bill, found it to be anti-people and anti-medical profession. “The IMA declared the Bill as crassly pro-rich even after the proposed amendments. It will make medical education inaccessible to poor and downtrodden and produce doctors predominantly from the rich and urban sections of the population.”
Therefore, he said, the IMA has a national duty to fight “this black law.”
“The Bill reserves 50% of the seats to the rich who can pay. This is denial of equitable opportunities and hence is certainly anti-people. The attitude and aptitude of the future doctors are bound to be commensurate to this infamous intervention,” Dr Pednekar said.
“The concept of centrally administered final MBBS exam will be highly detrimental to students from rural & tribal areas. These exams have an inbuilt urban and rich bias in them thus depriving the students from downtrodden and backward communities,” he said.
IMA Goa unit office bearers Dr Sandeep Naik and Survesh Dubashi also addressed the media.
