By IANS,
Lucknow : Work in almost all government hospitals and dispensaries across Uttar Pradesh was paralysed shortly after a chief medical officer (CMO) was murdered outside his residence here Saturday morning.
V.P. Singh, 50, the chief medical officer for family welfare, was killed in the Gomti Nagar area when he was taking a morning walk.
Following the killing of Singh, who was the general secretary of the Uttar Pradesh Provincial Medical Service Association (UPPMSA), doctors at all state-run medical and health centres boycotted work.
They demanded immediate arrest of the killers and sought a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the incident.
Due to the the doctors’ strike, post-mortem examination and emergency services were stalled in hospitals across the 72 districts. Patients faced a harrowing time as the para-medical staff too joined the strike.
Association president U.N. Rai said: “We had no choice but to proceed on strike as we had reason to believe that laxity and callousness of the state police was responsible for the murder.”
“Six months back, the earlier incumbent on the same position was gunned down under similar circumstances,” he said, recalling that then Lucknow CMO (family welfare) Vinod Arya was gunned down in October 2010.
Award of huge contracts for supply of goods and equipment under the centrally-funded National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) appeared to be linked to the murders, according to government doctors.
They alleged that pilferage out of the NRHM funds could be behind Singh’s killing.
The NRHM covers areas including maternal and child health, immunisation, blindness control programme, leprosy control, tuberculosis and several vector-borne diseases.