West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said Monday that Kolkata Police Commissioner Vineet Goyal had offered to resign, but that she could not accept his resignation at least until the end of the Durga Puja festivities next month.
The Commissioner’s resignation is one of the demands of the junior doctors protesting after the rape and murder of one of their colleagues at Kolkata’s R G Kar Medical College and Hospital.
“The Police Commissioner came to me to tender his resignation… How can I accept that before Durga Puja? He knows all the roads of Kolkata and how to control the situation. After the festive season, we can think about this,” Banerjee said at an administrative review meeting at the state secretariat, Nabanna.
Urging the striking doctors to return to work, Banerjee also asked them to “return to festivities” with Durga Puja coming up.
“I request you to return to festivities and demand that the CBI complete its investigations at the earliest,” she said.
The CBI is investigating the rape and murder of a junior doctor, who was found dead in a seminar hall at R G Kar Medical College and Hospital on August 9. The incident sent shockwaves across the country, and junior doctors in West Bengal have been on strike since then.
On Monday, the Supreme Court said the protesters should return to work by 5 pm Tuesday.
Speaking at Nabanna, Mamata offered to meet with the protesters. “They can come to talk with me in groups of five-six. I am ready to hear their demands. The Health Secretary has already sat with them and he implemented all their demands,” she said.
She defended the Kolkata Police, which came in for criticism of its handling of the protests.
“The police did a commendable job and allowed protesters to carry out their movement – something that would never be allowed in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, or other states. The protesters did not even ask permission for the protest, but even then, we allowed it,” she said.
The CM said that her government had not taken action even after the protesters started using microphones late at night. “Every day, in the name of the movement, they are using them (microphones). People are disturbed. The ill and the elderly people are suffering. Even then, we did not take any action,” Banerjee said.
She rejected the Centre’s claim in the Supreme Court earlier this month that the West Bengal government was not cooperating in providing facilities to the CISF personnel stationed at R G Kar. “We gave them everything, what else can we do? We can’t give them dress materials also. The Centre and some Left parties are doing a conspiracy,” she alleged.
She also dismissed claims of evidence tampering, saying, “We have no holy cow to protect.”
The CM pushed back against claims that the government had asked the victim’s family to accept financial assistance. “There are people accusing me of speaking of money. I never said any such thing…,” she said.
Referring to her meeting with the murdered doctor’s parents on August 12, she said: “I told the parents that if they had plans to honour their daughter’s memory, our government would stand by them. I know what words to utter in such situations.”
During the administrative review meeting, the Chief Minister reportedly took steps aimed at streamlining operations of government hospitals.
Banerjee on Monday instructed Health Secretary Narayan Swaroop Nigam to hold a meeting with authorities of all medical colleges and hospitals next Thursday, and also to make a list of senior doctors practising in private hospitals.
She also instructed that politicians should be removed as heads of patient welfare committees (Rogi Kalyan Samiti) of state-run medical colleges and hospitals. “Nigam, appoint the principals or superintendents of hospitals as chairpersons of Rogi Kalyan Samitis,” she told the Health Secretary at the meeting. Currently, the chairpersons of all Rogi Kalyan Samitis are MLAs.
On hospital security, the Chief Minister said, “Police will be at outposts, but the total security (of hospitals) should be managed with private security… They should be blacklisted if they indulge in any misdeeds during duty,” she said.
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