Buckling under pressure from the striking junior doctors,the state Government on Thursday revoked the suspension of Medical College principal Jaswinder Pal Kaur Shergill and junior doctor Neha Sharma of the paediatrics department. They were suspended in connection with the incubator fire in which six infants were burnt alive at the Government Rajindra Hospital on Januray 31. While Shergill has been posted as head of the department of surgery,medical superintendent Surinder Singh has been given additional charge of the Medical College principal. This comes a day after the Government rejected the resignation of Minister for Medical Education and Research Tikshan Sud,who had resigned taking moral responsibility for the incident. None of them was available for comment. Happy with the revocation of the suspension orders,the striking junior doctors ended their two-day-old strike. They had also demanded upgradation of the hospital infrastructure but the Government has sought a months time for this. Meanwhile,the one-man probe panel of Justice K C Gupta,a retired judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court,on Thursday started its probe into the tragic incident. He inspected the photo-therapy unit of the gynae wing of the hospital,where the incident had occurred. He was accompanied by Patiala SDM Gurmeet Singh,who has been appointed by the Patiala district administration to conduct a preliminary magisterial inquiry into the fire incident. Justice Gupta also inspected a similar nursery for infants at the paediatrics department. He sought a detailed status report of the electrical appliances and fittings installed at the site.
