India’s Supreme Court has set up a national task force of doctors to make recommendations on workplace safety following the rape and murder of a trainee medic at a state hospital that prompted nationwide protests.
After taking up the issue independently, the court said on Tuesday that the physicians’ panel was being formed to create national standards for the security and safety of healthcare professionals.
It directed the task force to submit an interim report within three weeks and a final report within two months.
India has been outraged by the 31-year-old trainee’s assault and killing inside a state-run hospital in the eastern city of Kolkata, the crime again highlighting sexual violence against women in the country. Her bloodied and brutalised body was found on August 9.
According to Chief Justice Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud Protecting the safety of doctors and women doctors is a matter of national interest and principle of equality. The nation cannot wait for another rape for it to take some steps,”
“If women cannot go to a place of work and be safe, then we are denying them the basic conditions of equality,” said Chandrachud, who headed a three-judge bench of the court.
The woman was murdered at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, the court also requested that federal police provide a report on the investigation’s progress on Thursday.
It also directed the federal paramilitary force to guard the hospital in Kolkata after female physicians expressed a lack of confidence in the security following the crime and the subsequent vandalism of the building by unidentified men.
