"Emergency Wards Shut Down!" Over 9,000 Junior Doctors on Strike Across Andhra Pradesh Over Pending Stipends and Job Injustice!

Government hospitals across Andhra Pradesh are facing a massive medical crisis as nearly 9,000 junior doctors, interns, and postgraduates have completely boycotted emergency wards, Intensive Care Units (ICUs), and operation theatres as their statewide strike entered its eighth day. Speaking from Andhra Medical College in Visakhapatnam, second-year postgraduate Dr. Akash explained that young doctors were pushed to this extreme step only after the state administration repeatedly ignored their official letters and emails regarding their legally mandated biennial stipend hike, which has been overdue since January.

The agitation, spearheaded by the Andhra Pradesh Junior Doctors Association (APJUDA) across all 19 state-run medical colleges, centers on three core demands. First, the doctors are demanding the immediate clearance of their long-pending stipend revision in accordance with official Government Orders (G.O.). Second, they are opposing the state government's proposal to raise the retirement age of senior doctors from 62 to 65 years, which young doctors argue will freeze new vacancies and block job openings for newly graduating specialists. Third, they are insisting that all assistant professor recruitments strictly follow National Medical Commission (NMC) eligibility norms rather than hiring non-medical degree holders into clinical departments.

With emergency wings, trauma centers, and routine outpatient care severely hit in major tertiary centers like Visakhapatnam's King George Hospital (KGH) and Vijayawada Government General Hospital, health authorities have deployed senior professors, department heads, and civil assistant surgeons to keep casualty and maternity wards running.