The Hindu : Karnataka News : Three former staff members of HIMS attempt suicide

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Tuesday, Apr 19, 2011
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Karnataka

Karnataka

Three former staff members of HIMS attempt suicide

Staff Correspondent

They have been admitted to hospital and are out of danger

The protesters are seeking their reinstatement in the Hassan Institute of Medical Sciences.

Hassan: Three former staff members of the Hassan Institute of Medical Sciences (HIMS), who were on fast demanding their reappointment, attempted suicide by consuming sleeping pills on Monday.

Bhagyamma (34), Pratibha (28) and Shesha Shetty (35), who attempted suicide, are being treated at the medical college hospital.

They were on fast since March 4. In a press conference on April 12, they had urged the State Government to resolve the issue by April 18. They had said that they would commit suicide if the deadline was not met. As there were no sign of the issue getting resolved, they attempted suicide on Monday afternoon.

District Surgeon K. Shankar said that all the three being treated at the hospital are out of danger and responding to treatment.

As many as 291 non-teaching staff members had been appointed in August 2010. However, the Government cancelled their appointments in a fortnight after they reported to duty as it was found that the recruitment process was in violation of the norms. Since then they have been staging protests.

Ms. Bhagyamma, who was an operation theatre technician, told presspersons that she had taken the extreme step because they had been on protest for the past eight months but the State Government had not responded to their demands positively. “Medical Education Minister A. Ramadas assured us last month that he would settle the matter in the next Cabinet meeting. But that did not happen”, she said.

Ms. Mamatha said that the High Court had directed the Government to resolve the issue but the Cabinet had been delaying it.

Representatives of the pro-people forums met the protesters and urged them not to resort to the extreme step.

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