West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said she was “ready to resign” for the “sake of people” and expressed regret over the junior doctors’ refusal to come for talks to resolve the impasse over the R G Kar rape-murder case.
Banerjee, who waited for nearly two hours for the agitating doctors to come for the meeting, said she also wanted the victim to get justice and apologised to the people of West Bengal for the continued deadlock.
“We have tolerated a lot of canards and insults for the last 33 days,” she said at a press conference but assured the protesters that despite violating the Supreme Court directive by not resuming duties, she would not take action against them.
In a dramatic turn of events, agitating junior doctors, who reached the gates of the state secretariat Nabanna, refused to hold talks with the state government unless their demand for live streaming of the meeting was met.
The talks were to be held at 5 pm in the presence of Banerjee as demanded by the protesters, who after reaching the secretariat around 5.25 pm, stayed put at the venue gate.
Banerjee said the meeting with the junior doctors cannot be live-streamed as demanded by them because the issue is sub-judice and before the Supreme Court. She said her government had made arrangements to record it and hand over the recording to them with the permission of the apex court if needed.
“For the sake of the people, I am ready to resign. I also want the victim to get justice, but this is not the way. We have tolerated a lot of canards and insults for the last 33 days. I thought the junior doctors would engage in talks for the sake of the patients and on humanitarian grounds,” she said.