A remark by Kerala health minister Veena George that the young doctor stabbed to death by a patient could have been scared owing to her "inexperience" triggered strong resentment.
"The house surgeon lacked enough experience. Hence, she might have gotten scared. That was what I could learn from doctors," the minister said while grieving over the incident.
The minister also said that there was adequate security at the Kottarakkara hospital in Kollam district where Dr Vandana Das was stabbed to death by a school teacher, identified as Sandeep.
Doctors, who went on a flash strike, have strongly reacted to the minister's remark and demanded her to withdraw the remark.
Reacting to the incident, the agitated doctors said that while Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan was having heavy security cover, the repeated pleas of the doctors to provide adequate security was being ignored by the government despite a series of incidents of attack on doctors.
Opposition leaders V D Satheesan of the Congress asked whether doctors should "learn martial arts" to protect themselves.
The health minister later said in a social media post that her statement was being misquoted by the media and the opposition.
Reacting to the doctor's murder, a doctor leading a stir in Thiruvananthapuram said that while Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan was having heavy security cover, the repeated pleas of the doctors to provide adequate security was being ignored by the government despite a series of incidents of attack on doctors.
Kerala Government Medical Officers Association state general secretary Dr Sunil P K said that at least now the government should make sincere efforts to set up a proper triage system at all hospitals to avoid such incidents in future.
The doctors will be on strike till Thursday morning.
According to the doctors' forums, during the last one year alone 130 instances of attack on doctors and hospital staff were reported in Kerala. The doctors' forums had gone on stir on many occasions demanding proper security to hospitals and stringent laws to curb such incidents. Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that a comprehensive probe would be conducted into the incident.