Doctors in the Indian megacity of Calcutta announced Tuesday the resumption of their strike to demand security measures after the murder and rape in August of a young intern, which sparked a wave of indignation throughout the country.
As soon as the body of this 31-year-old woman was discovered on August 9 in the Calcutta hospital where she was on duty, the interns stopped work and began negotiations with the local authorities to obtain guarantees on their safety.
After a month of protest, they returned to work less than two weeks ago, particularly in the city’s emergency services.
“The state government [du Bengale occidental] failed to guarantee us safety in our workplaces,” a spokesperson for the interns’ union, Aniket Mahato, explained to AFP to justify the resumption of the movement.
Mr. Mahato notably cited broken promises regarding video surveillance cameras and promised that strikers would return to the streets on Tuesday evening to demand these improvements.
Thousands of Indians demonstrated almost daily alongside them in Calcutta for several weeks to support the internees.
The Calcutta crime has revived in India the bitter memory of the one suffered by a young woman on a New Delhi bus in 2012.
A suspect has been arrested for the murder and rape of the doctor, but the attitude of local authorities and the conduct of the investigation are the subject of strong criticism.
The police chief and several regional health service officials were dismissed from their positions.