'No live streaming or videography': Mamata Banerjee sends 'final' invite to protesting doctors for talks today

Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has sent a 'fifth and final' invitation to protesting doctors for talks at her residence in Kolkata, India Today reported on Monday. The doctors have been invited for a meeting at 5 pm. In a letter, the West Bengal Chief Secretary urged the doctors to meet Banerjee at her Kalighat residence for a "discussion with an open mind".

The chief secretary, however, made it clear that there would be no live streaming or videography of the meeting. "We trust that good sense will prevail, and as mutually agreed and as per your statement to the media day before, there will be no live streaming or videography of the meeting, given that the matter is sub judice in the highest court of the country," he said, adding that the minutes of the meeting will be recorded and signed by both parties.

The doctors are currently holding a general body meeting after which they will decide whether they accept the invitation for talks. 

The same delegation that engaged in discussions for the last meeting has been asked to arrive at the Bengal Chief Minister's residence at 4.45 pm.

This Sunday, Banerjee made a surprise visit to the site where junior doctors were protesting and assured them that their demands would be addressed, asking them to come for talks. However, the proposed meeting fell through with the protesters claiming that they were asked to leave "unceremoniously" after waiting for three hours at the gates of the chief minister's residence. 

After the protesters refused to enter Banerjee's residence due to the government's rejection of their demand for a live telecast, she came out to appeal to the doctors to join the talks and urged them "not to insult her," and promised them that a signed copy of the minutes of the meeting would be given. 

The protesters claimed that they agreed to have the meeting without the live-streaming, a key demand of theirs. An agitating doctor said they had agreed to attend the meeting without live-streaming as Banerjee requested, but after notifying the Minister of State for Health of this decision, they were told to leave because it was too late and the officials had been waiting for three hours. 

Meanwhile, the CBI has arrested former RG Kar Hospital principal Sandip Ghosh and  Abhijit Mondal, the officer-in-charge of Tala police station, on charges of misleading the investigation and altering the crime scene. 
 

(with inputs from Rittick Mondal)