The Supreme Court has directed hospitals, including the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi, to regularise the absence of doctors who participated in protests following the rape and murder of a trainee doctor at Kolkata’s RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in August 2024. 

The order comes amid concerns that some institutions had treated the protest period as leave rather than acknowledging it as justified absence.

A bench led by Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna, along with Justice Sanjay Kumar, responded to submissions from a doctors’ association, which pointed out that while several hospitals complied with the court’s earlier directive, others — including AIIMS Delhi — continued to treat the absence as leave. 

PTI reports that the court clarified its stance, stating, “If protesting workers had joined work post the Supreme Court order then their absence shall be regularised and not be treated as absence from duty.” 

The bench, however, emphasised that this decision was specific to this case and would not serve as a legal precedent.

Concerns were raised about medical post-graduate students facing difficulties due to the hospitals’ classification of their protest period as leave. The Centre’s legal representative, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, assured the court that hospitals would comply with the ruling, as PTI reports.