Opposition parties in Bengal demand Mamata Banerjee's resignation as health minister

PTI: The opposition parties in West Bengal slammed Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday for her alleged threats to the striking doctors and sought her immediate resignation as health minister.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Communist Party of India(Marxist) and the Congress claimed she is behaving like Hitler and not interested to solve the impasse.

In the wake of disruption of medical services in several parts of the state over the past three days, Mamata Banerjee directed the agitating junior doctors to resume work and warned of action if the order is not followed.

The doctors, however, decided to continue their stir.

"Instead of expressing solidarity to the doctors, she is threatening them. He is behaving like an authoritarian, like a Hitler. This is shameful. She (Mamata Banerjee) has failed both as the chief minister and the health minister. She should resign immediately," BJP leader Mukul Roy said.

State BJP vice-president Jay Prakash Majumdar said Mamata Banerjee was indulging in blame game instead of solving the problem.

"Is this a way to deal with the agitating doctors? Instead of solving the problem, she is blaming the doctors, the BJP and others. If she can't control the situation, she should resign as the health minister," Jay Prakash Majumdar said.

Jay Prakash Majumdar also criticised Mamata Banerjee for referring to Union Home Minister and BJP president Amit Shah during her speech at the SSKM Hospital on Thursday morning.

"BJP chief Amit Shah is encouraging his party cadre to create communal tension and run a propaganda on Facebook," she said and claimed that the doctors' agitation is a conspiracy of the BJP and the CPI(M).

"She is trying to hide her failures by blaming others. If she can't control the situation, she should resign and let us take over. We would show her how to solve such problems," Majumdar said.

Accusing the Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo of politicising the issue, CPI(M) central committee member Sujan Chakraborty said Mamata Banerjee does not seem interested in ending the impasse.

"Is she is at all concerned about solving the problem, or does she just want to politicise the matter?" he said.

State Congress President Somen Mitra also criticised the chief minister and said the state government should take appropriate measures to ensure safety and security of doctors.

"It is the duty of the state government to ensure proper law and order condition in the state. But at the same time we would also like to appeal to the doctors to resume the services as lots of poor patients are suffering," Somen Mitra said.

Doctors across the state have called for a strike in protest against the attack on two of their colleagues at NRS Medical College and Hospital in the city by family members of a patient, who died on Monday night.

Services have been affected over the past three days in emergency wards, outdoor facilities and pathological units of many state-run medical colleges and hospitals and a number of private medical facilities in the state, leaving the patients in the lurch.