Different organisations of doctors on Monday unanimously demanded the federal and provincial governments to arrest the culprits involved in doctors’ killing in Karachi and try them in military courts.
Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) Karachi chapter organised a condolence meeting over the killing of doctors, at PMA House which was chaired by PMA President Professor Dr Idrees Adhi and Dr Qazi Wasiq. The representatives of PMA Center, Sindh Doctors’ Welfare Organisation (SDWO), Pakistan Islamic Medical Association (PIMA), Pakistan Orthopaedic Association (POA), Medical Aid Committee and other organisations attended the meeting.
The meeting condoled the killing of two doctors including child specialist Dr Akbar Ali and homeopath Dr Yawar Hussain who were shot dead in their clinics on January 10.
The doctors’ organisations unanimously condemned the killing of doctors, demanded compensation for the bereaved families and suggested to observe strike and stage sit-in in hospitals. They demanded bringing the culprits to book and demanded the authorities concerned to try them in military courts in order to stop the menace of target killing of health practitioners in the city.
Prof Dr Idrees Adhi in his remarks said that the key factor behind the doctors’ killing in Karachi was sectarianism.
“Besides this, doctors are being killed over refusal to provide extortion money, ransom, ethnic discrimination, affiliation with political parties and others reasons,” he said.
Dr Kaleem Butt said unfortunately two health practitioners were killed within 15 minutes in the same locality but no political leader bothered to condemn the murders. He said doctors’ organisations must devise a comprehensive plan before launching their protest in public hospitals of Sindh to protest against the killing of their colleagues.
POA President Professor Dr Muhammad Pervez Anjum said patrolling of law enforcers must be assigned to protect doctors during clinic hours. He suggested initiating phase-wise protest demonstrations and sit-ins to record their protest against doctors’ killings.
PMA senior leader Dr SM Qaisar Sajjad said all private clinics, hospitals and public hospitals should jointly shut down their institutions on the same day to give a strong message to the government and other institutions so that they can take required steps to get the killing of doctors in Karachi stopped.
PMA Secretary General Mirza Ali Azhar said doctors’ organisations, civil society and media must support the doctors protesting against the killing of their colleagues.
SDWO leader Dr Nawaz Mallah said doctors want protection as per the constitution and have the right to protest against killing of their colleagues.