‘I need to feel safe’: After Indian rape and murder, doctors demand change

Kolkata, India – On August 21, a hot, humid afternoon, thousands of doctors and medical students marched through the capital of the eastern Indian state of West Bengal. Female doctors led the march, many in black T-shirts, some with stethoscopes around their necks.

Among the banners the protesters held, one in particular spelled out the tragedy that united them: “She had taken an oath to save lives, not lose her own,” it said.

The doctors and students were calling for justice for a 31-year-old trainee medic who was raped and murdered in one of the largest government-run hospitals and medical colleges in Kolkata on August 9.

The murder has prompted nationwide protests, with professionals from medical colleges across West Bengal as well as other residents of Kolkata coming out to protest, march and hold candlelit vigils. A major protest is planned for Tuesday, with organisers calling on participants to march to Nabanna, the complex that houses the West Bengal state government.

Among the protesters at the August 21 rally was 31-year-old Sapna*, a junior doctor from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, the institution where the trainee doctor was killed. Like many other doctors and students who spoke to Al Jazeera, she asked that her name be changed because she feared repercussions from the hospital and college administrators.

“If a woman doctor can be killed in a hospital while on duty, where can we women ever feel safe again?” Sapna asked, before breaking off to join the chants of, “We want justice.”

“I love what I do,” she continued, wiping sweat from her glasses. “It is a passion, not a profession. But I need to feel safe inside the hospital and I need to see justice being done to our dead colleague.”

Increased security measures

Hundreds of medical students, junior doctors, college alumni and colleagues from other medical schools have gathered for a dharna, or sit-in protest, at RG Kar.

A bamboo shelter with waterproof sheeting has been built just inside the hospital’s main gates to protect the protesters from monsoon downpours. Nearby is the seven-storey building that houses the seminar hall where the victim’s body was found. She had gone to the room to rest during a 36-hour shift.

A 33-year-old police volunteer, part of a civic volunteer force employed by the government and tasked with assisting police at the hospital, has been arrested and charged with the crime.

Anita*, 29, a junior doctor, recalled learning of her colleague’s death. She had been working in the gynaecology-obstetrics outpatient department when another colleague called her at about 11am to say a doctor had been found dead. Anita raced upstairs to the seminar room where about a dozen junior doctors had gathered along with police and other hospital staff.

“I was in a daze. I could not imagine something like this could happen in my college,” she said.

Anita says she is too scared to return to work. “I still tremble at the thought of what happened to her. I don’t have the courage to go back to work in the same building or any other building in the hospital till they do something about tightening the security. Actually, I may never be able to go back in there again.”

The protesting doctors say they aren’t only scared; they’re angry.

Part of that anger stems from how the hospital authorities handled the murder. The victim’s parents were initially told by hospital authorities that their daughter had died by suicide. An autopsy confirmed that she had been raped and murdered. The Supreme Court has raised concerns about the hospital’s actions and the case is being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation.

“The insensitive way in which the whole thing was handled by the hospital authorities was stunning,” said Aniruddh*, a trainee doctor, before adding: “Please don’t disclose my real name. They may fail us in our exams if we speak too much.”

While none of the doctors Al Jazeera spoke to reported experiencing assault or harassment themselves in the workplace, they all said they feared for their safety.

About 75 percent of Indian doctors have faced some form of violence at work, according to a 2015 survey by the Indian Medical Association.

The West Bengal Junior Doctors’ Front (WBJDF), the organisation at the helm of the doctors’ protests in the state, is calling for increased security measures in medical colleges, hospitals and health centres in cities and rural areas.

“We have CCTV cameras that don’t work, many zones that are not covered, no one monitors the camera outputs,” explained Hassan Mushtaq, a member of WBJDF and a junior doctor at RG Kar.

‘Cannot function if I feel unsafe’

As Anita broke off from chanting at the hospital protest site, a fellow protester passed her a bottle of water. “I have no fear of working for long hours. I have no fear of dealing with dozens of patients with the most complicated problems. I can deal with no personal life after 36 hours of duty when you just want to eat something and sleep,” she said between sips. “But I cannot function if I feel unsafe.”

She described how patients are often accompanied by at least half a dozen relatives, who can turn aggressive if they feel dissatisfied with the care their loved one is receiving. She recalled an occasion when a male relative of a female patient accused her of not treating the patient promptly. The man tapped her roughly on the shoulder.  “I felt threatened, my personal space breached. Security staff managed to usher the irate man away,” she recalled.

Rita*, 30, another doctor participating in the sit-in described an incident “when a drunken youth was brought into ER with fatal injuries by a bunch of young men who were also inebriated”.

“We managed to intubate him but it was too late. He died. His friends immediately turned on me, not just verbally abusing me but almost physically pushing me,” she said.

“The security personnel were outnumbered and helpless. Some male hospital staff – attendants and cleaners – came to my rescue. Why should this happen to any doctor?”

Another doctor, 29-year-old Sita*, said she once caught a visitor secretively filming her. When she told him to stop, he became aggressive. With no security in sight, some senior female nurses came to her assistance.

“Confronted by so many angry women, he slunk off,” Sita said. “It’s a strain to deal with such pressures every day.”

Anita says female doctors live with the fear that the verbal harassment they face “could turn physical at any point”.

“The security personnel posted around the hospital are not policemen, never enough in number and do not appear trained to tackle [difficult] situations, so we always feel at risk,” she added, “which is why for me this time it is a do or die battle [for the security we need].”

‘I am frightened’

It isn’t only the doctors who are concerned.

Bonolota Chattopadhayay, 73, came out to one of the protests in the city’s south. Walking with a limp alongside her son, she explained how she has been unable to sleep “ever since the incident at the RG Kar hospital”.

“I have always worried about my teenage granddaughters when they go out on their own or are late coming home from school or college. But after the rape and murder of a doctor at RG Kar, I am not just worried, I am frightened about what could happen to them. I want this situation to change.”

Tamashree Bhowmik, a teacher, brought her eight-year-old daughter to the same march.

“I want a safe life for my daughter. She is going to grow up and go to work, perhaps away from home. I need to know she will be safe,” she said. “This is my way of pushing for change in how society and men look at women, treat women, abuse them.”

‘They don’t listen to women’

The Supreme Court last week established a task force of doctors to make workplace safety recommendations for medical workers.

Meanwhile, the West Bengal government’s response to the doctors’ demand for greater safety has drawn criticism. It has introduced a new scheme called “Rattirer Shaathi” or “Helpers of the Night” under which women will have designated safe zones and toilets, an app connected to an alarm system as well as female volunteers on duty at night. But one instruction has caused new outrage – that night shifts for female hospital staff be avoided “wherever possible”.

“How can a government that is led by a very powerful woman leader suggest something like this,” said Ruchira Goswami, a feminist and assistant professor of sociology, gender and law at the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences in Kolkata, referring to the state government under Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. “They don’t listen to women. They are not bothered to create an ecosystem where people can work safely. They are shoving us women back into the Middle Ages.”

Anita agrees. “I don’t know if this idea has come from a government in the 21st century or 17th,” she said.

Tougher laws against rape were introduced in 2013 after 23-year-old trainee physiotherapist Jyoti Singh was gang-raped on a bus in New Delhi and later died of her injuries. But annual data from India’s National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) on crimes against women shows a steady annual increase in the number of rapes being committed in the country.

Goswami says that data reflects both an increase in attacks on women and greater reporting of rape. She considers the rise in the number of rapes to be part of a backlash. “As women claim their rights more and more aggressively, the patriarchal backlash is greater,” she said. “What is more potent than rape to show women their place?”

*Names have been changed at the request of the interviewees