Dr KC sipped juice offered by one of his patients, 10-year-old Subad Adhikari of Dhading District, and Satya Narayan Ram, 43, of Saptari. Subad is an orthopedic patient who was admitted to TUTH for the treatment of a thigh bone that was broken by his teacher, and Ram is a cobbler who has been working in front of Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH).Demanding fulfillment of his 10-point demand, Dr KC, a senior professor at IoM, has been staging a hunger strike for the past 12 days. Earlier, an 11-point agreement was inked by a government talks team and Dr KC's representatives. Dr KC agreed to break his indefinite fast after the government agreed to respond to most of his demands.
Speaking at a function held at TUTH to mark the ageement, Dr KC expressed gratitude to all the public, media and students for their support to his cause. "This is the achievement of 30 million people," said Dr KC. He also urged the people to safeguard the achievements.
"Staging a hunger strike was not my choice but they compelled me," said Dr KC. He alleged that the government compelled him to stage repeated hunger strikes because it breached the agreements signed in the past.
Prof. Y.P. Singh, who led the talks team from Dr KC's side, had read out the agreement they signed with the government. The government had tasked Dr Govinda Pokharel, Vice-chairperson of the National Planning Commission (NPC), and Chief Secretary Lilamani Poudel with working out the agreement and persuading Dr KC to end his hunger strike.
Speaking at the function, Dr Pokharel assured Dr KC that the government was fully committed to implementing the agreement. He said that points in the agreement such as tabling a Medical University Bill in parliament within the next three months, implementing the report of the committee drafting a health education policy, giving the committee an enhanced mandate to recommend clear policy, and disaffiliating the medical colleges that are found not to be fulfilling the requirements, are significant achievements of Dr KC's Satyagraha.
As per the points in the agreements, the government will not provide affiliation to new medical colleges or permit any existing medical colleges to extent their program until the committee led by Kedar Bhakta Mathema submits its report. New affiliations and extensions will be provided as per the recommendations of the Mathema committee.
Likewise, the government will forward the report of the probe committee led by Jaya Ram Giri to the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) for taking action against office bearers who have been implicated. Th prime minister, who is chancellor of TU, has written to not implement the decision taken by its senate concerning IoM's program.
The government has also agreed to form a commission in the next seven days under a former appellate court judge, to probe office bearers of TU, Kathmandu University (KU) and Nepal Medical Council (NMC) for their alleged role in providing new affiliations, issuing letters of intent (LoI), and giving permission to extend programs and other steps.
The government has also agreed to open government medical colleges in all five development regions within the next five years and stop the extension program for KU, take action against officials concerned and find a solution for managing students enrolling under the extension program.
The government has likewise agreed to provide additional powers to the Mathema committee to recommend a scientific fee structure for medical courses and implement these from the upcoming academic session.
The agreement was signed by Dr KC, NPC Vice Chairperson Pokharel, Chief Secretary Poudel and Nepal Medical Association (NMA) Chairman Anjani Kumar Jha.
Meanwhile, NMA, an umbrella organization of medical doctors which called a nationwide strike in the health sector, called off the protest from Thursday. Due to the strike called by NMA, thousands of patients across the country had been deprived of medical services.
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