Dr B Thomas (Special correspondent)
G
overnment is committed to ensuring safety to doctors,strict measures will be taken against those who assault doctors:Karnataka Health Minister.
I encourage more and more youngsters to come into politics:Health Minister Sudhakar.
“The Karnataka government is committed to ensuring safety to doctors.Strict measures were taken against those who abuse or assault doctors.
Because of this,in recent years,the number of such incidents have gone down and awareness is increasing,”said Karnataka Health Minister Dr K Sudhakar while interacting with medical students at BMCRI on Thursday,August 25.
The interaction event was dubbed the ‘Yuva Samvada’ which translates to ‘Interaction with Youth.’
During the event the Health and Medical Education Minister tried to have a free interaction with the students to try and understand the aspirations and concerns faced by medical students.
The Medical Education Minister went so far as to ask all the faculty except the Dean and Principal to leave the auditorium to make the students comfortable interacting with him.
During the interaction,Minister Sudhakar answered several questions and also provided assurance that all measures will be taken to address their concerns.
Replying to a question about attacks on doctors by a student named Akash Gangadhar,the Minister responded that he as the minister has taken a lot of measures to prevent attacks on doctors.
The issue is that some families feel that the doctor was responsible in case the patient dies. But the reality is that each doctor tries his best to save the patient.
The law allows very strict action to be taken against those who assault doctors and the government too has ensured that strict action has been taken against such people.
Attackers can be jailed for many years and a fine can also be imposed on them.The punishments must be publicised on social media to curb such behavior.The government will always stand by the doctors,Minister Sudhakar said.
The current batch which has worked during the pandemic has gained immense experience to handle such huge massive health crisis,Minister Sudhakar said.
Answering another question where a student asked,won’t increasing the number of medical colleges,more than engineering colleges,reduce the demand for doctors and end up causing unemployment,“Minister sudhakar stated,earlier, there used to be one doctor for every 2,300 people and now the number has improved to one doctor for every 900 people.
If we include Ayush doctors,the number stands at one doctor for 700 people.We have a population of 130 crore in our country and this indeed needs many more medical colleges.Also,medical tourism is growing in India.
Each college costs on an average Rs 750 crore and we are constructing the colleges through the PPP model to reduce the financial burden.
Till now,9 districts in Karnataka still don’t have medical colleges.We are trying to open colleges in Davanagere,Udupi,Kolar and Bengaluru Rural districts.
However, there won’t be a reduction of job opportunities in the medical field like engineering. More and more opportunities are coming up for doctors now.Never will doctors face unemployment,Minister Sudhakar said.
Answering a question by a student,Manikanthan on how to bring more students to politics, Minister Sudhakar asked people to take him as an example and enter politics.
All laws are formulated by representatives elected by people.If educated people who are willing to serve society dont come into politics it will cause huge problems.
It is true that coming to politics is a very laborious process.However, take an example of our Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji who was once a tea seller and has now risen up to the level of the Prime Minister.
This is the beauty of democracy.More youngsters need to enter politics to create a better society, Minister Sudhakar said.
One student suggested that the college fees must be reduced and they also suggested that uniformity must be brought in the stipends.
To this,Minister Sudhakar responded saying,Our govt increased the stipend by 30% to 60%, despite the revenue crunch during pandemic, which was never revised in the past eight years by previous governments.That shows our commitment.
