1. As per Supreme Court Judgement of 2014, Doctors working in govt setup do not come under the definition of a labourer.
2.The relevant SC judgement is reproduced herein " Medical Professionals are not 'workmen' and the Benefits under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 are available only to ‘workmen’. If one is a manager or a professional, he is outside the ambit of the act. In ESI Corporation Medical Officer’s Assoication v. ESI Corporation, the Supreme Court held that a medical professional treating patients and diagonsing diseases cannot be held to be a ‘workmen’ under Section 2(s) of the Industrial Disputes Act. The two judge bench consisting of KSP Radhakrishan and AK Sikri, therein drew a distinction between ‘occupation’ and profession’, and held that an occupation is a principal activity related to job, work or calling that earns regular wages for a person; and a profession on the other hand, requires extensive training, study and mastery of the subject, whether it is teaching students, providing legal advice or treating patients or diagnosing diseases. Hence, the court was of the opinion that professionals are not workmen within the meaning of Section 2(s) of the ID Act".
3. normal weekly hours of work are FORTY TO FORTY EIGHT hours per week.
4. Reproduced herein "As the graph of errors and accidents increases steeply this 100% increase (24 hrs continuous duty in place of 12 hours maximum limit) in duty hours is sufficiently enough to do BLUNDERS AND ENDANGER human life.
“A doctor at his 20th-24th hour of continuous duty in Emergency ward, if not able to provide proper care to the patient for whom even a single minute can prove life saving or Fatal. This way if patients suffer than who will be HELD RESPONSIBLE, the Doctor on duty or the HOD or DME or the Govt.?”
Because doctor is performing unofficial extended hours, and he/she has the reason to state that doctor was not in his/her proper mental and physical condition due to chronic sleep deprivation and exhaustion. In fact this extended hour coincides with the mid night and early morning time, when all those patients who come to casualty irrespective of there diagnosis, feel that if
they will delay till morning it may be harmful/fatal to them and most of the times indeed these emergencies are life threatening. With great hope in mid night when they visit hospital for proper care, they find a drowsy, tired, exhausted doctor, who is not even able to examine properly. The general impression becomes that doctor has neglected him, where as patient hardly knows doctor’s real condition. After all patients do deserve the proper and efficient care, especially when there is no scarcity of doctors and this duty regime is artificially motivated".
4. If something happens to the patient the liable persons are all the three, the Duty Doctor, HOD and the Medical Superintendent of Hospital.
