Doctors protest against Aruna Kumar's appointment as Director of Medical Education in Bhopal

Bhopal, May 3 (IANS) The Madhya Pradesh government's decision to appoint Aruna Kumar as the new Director of Medical Education (DME) at Bhopal's Gandhi Medical College (GMC) has sparked a controversy.

To oppose Kumar's appointment as DME, Junior Doctors Association along with Medical Teachers Association (MTA) of GMC, state's biggest medical institution, on Saturday staged a protest.

Protesting doctors demanded that the state government should rollback its decision to appoint Kumar as GMC's DME, citing examples of suicide case of two junior doctors during her tenure as the Head of the Department (HoD) of gynaecology in 2023.

MTA General Secretary of GMC, Rakesh Malviya said that Aruna Kumar was removed from GMC on two occasions due to bad behaviour with her staff.

Several doctors and other staff members have complained against Kumar's bad behaviour.

"Aruna Kumar was removed from the post of HoD of gynaecology department after a junior doctor Bala Maheshwari ended her life by suicide at GMC's hostel. She was removed from the post following the intervention of Union Health Minister in 2023. We are surprised with the state government's decision to appoint her as new DME," Malviya told IANS.

Malviya also told that a delegation of MTA has also met Deputy Chief Minister Rajendra Shukla, who is also the Health Minister of Madhya Pradesh, and have demanded to rollback its decision.

"Today's protest was just an indication, and if the government not takes back its decision, all junior doctors and other medical staffs will go on indefinite strike, and then the government will be responsible for disturbance in medical services at GMC," he added.

During the protest at GMC, doctors were holding pamphlets and banners having photos of Bala Saraswati, a Hyderabad-based medical student, who had ended her life at GMC in July 2023.

Police had then recovered a suicide note (from WhatsApp message) in which she had mentioned that constant mental torture from Aruna Kumar forced her to end her life.

Later, in January 2024, a 27-year-old junior doctor Akanksha Maheswari, a resident of Gwalior, had also died by suicide and she had also blamed the toxic culture at GMC.

Following these incidents, Aruna Kumar was removed from the post of HoD (gynaecology), however, she was reinstated as the HoD of obstetrics and gynaecology few months later.

--IANS

pd/khz