Protest at Pune’s Sassoon Hospital: Patients wait as doctors and staff continue strike | Via puneripages.in
By Prashant for PuneriPages.in
For 500 patients at Sassoon Hospital in Pune, the past week has been a slow, silent agony.
Their surgeries—from critical orthopedic repairs to long-awaited procedures that could transform lives—have been indefinitely postponed. Not because of lack of equipment. Not due to any disaster. But because the nurses who are the backbone of this government hospital are on strike, and their absence is rippling across every ward.
Table of Contents
The Numbers: 500 Surgeries Delayed, 900 Nurses on Strike
Sassoon General Hospital, one of Maharashtra’s busiest public hospitals, has had to delay over 500 surgeries since the Maharashtra State Nurses Association began their statewide strike. It’s now Day 6, and the impact is only deepening.
What the Nurses Are Fighting For
This isn’t a sudden walkout. The nurses have been raising their voices for years. Here’s what they’re asking:
- Permanent Posts: Thousands of nurses are working on contract with no job security.
- Filling Vacancies: Many posts remain empty, increasing the workload on existing staff.
- Fair Allowances: They seek uniform and nursing allowances on par with central government nurses.
- Old Pension Scheme (OPS): A demand to restore the more secure OPS for government employees.
One striking nurse, speaking anonymously, told us:
“We love our patients. We never wanted it to come to this. But we are being treated like dispensable staff. This strike is our last resort to be heard.”
Inside Sassoon: A Hospital Under Siege
The operating theaters are mostly silent. Only life-saving emergency surgeries are going ahead. Meanwhile, trainee nurses, interns, and senior doctors are stepping in to cover essential services—but it’s not sustainable.
An internal source described the scene:
“We’re working triple shifts. Senior doctors are administering IV drips. Medical interns are managing entire wards. It’s a crisis, no question.”
Dr. Vinayak Kale, Dean of BJ Medical College and Sassoon Hospital, said:
“We understand the nurses’ concerns and have communicated them to the government. Meanwhile, our team is doing everything possible to ensure patient care isn’t compromised.”
One Patient. One Story. One Heartbreaking Delay.
Among the 500 affected is Santosh Jadhav, a farmer from a village near Saswad. He came to Sassoon with a shattered leg bone after falling from his tractor.
His surgery was scheduled for last Friday.
It didn’t happen.
He lies in the orthopedic ward, leg elevated, in pain. Every day without surgery pushes his recovery further and threatens his ability to return to the fields—his only source of income.
His wife, holding back tears, said:
“We came here because we couldn’t afford a private hospital. But now, he just lies here, waiting. We don’t know when this will end.”
A Three-Way Tragedy
This is not a simple matter of staff on strike. It’s a three-way crisis:
- The Patients who are suffering.
- The Nurses fighting for dignity and fairness.
- The Hospital trying to hold the system together.
This deadlock needs urgent resolution—for the sake of patients like Santosh, for the morale of healthcare workers, and for the survival of Pune’s public healthcare system.
As the strike stretches on, one thing is clear: a hospital without nurses isn’t a hospital at all.
If you’ve ever been treated at a government hospital or know someone who has, this is your moment to care.
About The Author
