With several Congress legislators running medical establishments themselves, the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) appears to be divided on the issue of tabling of the Karnataka Private Medical Establishments (Amendment) Bill 2017 in the Legislative Assembly during the ongoing session.
Though a couple of legislators raised the issue of doctors’ strike and the KPME Bill during the CLP meeting chaired by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah here on Wednesday, the Chief Minister apparently told the legislators not to raise the issue since he would discuss the matter with Health and Family Welfare Minister K.R. Ramesh Kumar and take a final decision.
Sources said the Chief Minister deliberately avoided a debate on the Bill for preventing the possibility of fissures coming out in the open. It is learnt that while several legislators have been opposing the KPME Bill since they have been running medical colleges and hospitals, Mr. Ramesh Kumar has been firm that the Bill has to be passed. He is learnt to be unhappy with the opposition within the party. Senior party leader and former Minister A.B. Malakaraddy, who is also a doctor by profession, has openly opposed the KPME Bill, saying it will not safeguard the interests of medical personnel as well the public. Asked about discussions about the KPME Bill in the CLP meeting, Mr. Ramesh Kumar had a cryptic one-line reply, “You ask my leader (Mr. Siddaramaiah).” Mr. Siddaramaiah too declined to comment on the Bill and the doctors’ stir.
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Congress MLA K.N. Rajanna, who tabled a report of the Joint Legislature Review Committee on the Bill, too did not speak, sources said. As of now, it is not clear if the government will table the Bill in the ongoing session.
JD(S) leader and former Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy had openly expressed the party’s support to the doctors’ strike and opposed some of the clauses in the Bill.