PROTEST AGAINST BJMC HOD

Medical students threaten to boycott OPDs from February 1

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TIMES NEWS NETWORK

31.01.2022

Ahmedabad: The protest at BJ Medical College and Civil Hospital against Dr Kamlesh Upadhyay, professor and head of the department (HoD) of medicine, for the alleged “illtreatment” meted out to final year MBBS students, entered its nineteenth day on Sunday.

The students have now threatened to boycott Out Patient Department (OPD) duties from February 1. But they will serve in the emergency and attend to Covid patients, they said. The protest intensified on Sunday after students and the JDA alleged that Dr Upadhyay has threatened to “fail students if protests are not withdrawn. ”

The medical students have even raised their ante against the state-appointed two-member committee investigating the matter, alleging partisan attitude. They further alleged that Dr Upadhyay was influencing the probe since he is treating a close family member of a senior IAS official in the health department.

Last month, the Junior  Doctors’ Association (JDA) of BJ Medical College and Civil Hospital had approached the anti-ragging committee of the college, seeking action against Dr Upadhyay.

“Dr Upadhyay had been adamant in not sending the internal marks of undergraduate students to Gujarat University (GU) and it was after a string of sit-out protests that the department had sent the marks on January 24. Why is Dr Upadhayay playing with our careers?” questioned JDA president Oman Prajapati.

The JDA in its petition has also alleged that since the pandemic Dr Upadhyay had been avoiding Covid duties and that even his elevation as HoD of medicine was being internally challenged as he was only the fifth senior among other eligible doctors for that post.

“We feel that an impartial inquiry against an individual like Dr Upadhyay, who wields such influence, is a distant possibility. It is this lack of faith that led us all to embark on this protest,” says Prajapati.

The JDA has also claimed that Dr Upadhyay had threatened postgraduate and undergraduate medical students, telling them that he would not send their marks to GU if ward duties were not adhered to.

“How can students who are attending to Covid patients be asked to visit other wards during the first, second and the third wave? Is that not putting other patients at risk of an infection,” asks Prajapati.