Fifty-nine senior doctors posted at two medical colleges in north Bengal on Wednesday tendered "mass resignations" as an expression of solidarity with the junior doctors who have been into protests and hunger strikes over the demand for a slew of measures for improvement of security at government-run medical colleges across the state.

Forty senior doctors at North Bengal Medical College and Hospital (NBMCH), the largest and oldest state-run referral hospital in the region, signed a mass resignation letter addressed to the director of medical education (DME). Similarly, 19 senior doctors of the Jalpaiguri Government Medical College & Hospital (JGMCH) tendered a mass resignation letter that was sent to the DME and the director of health services (DHS) of the state.

“We have sent the mass resignation letter as we are dismayed over the state’s failure to address the concerns of the junior doctors, who are on hunger strike, especially over issues like safety. We the doctors at NBMCH want the state to act immediately,” said Dipanjan Bandyopadhyay, a professor at the medicine department.

The senior doctors who resigned included the acting principal, Bidyut Goswami, Nirmal Bera, the head of neuropsychiatry, and Dipanjan Bandopadhyay.

“If the state government doesn't concede the demands of the junior doctors, more senior doctors will tender mass resignations,” said a source at the NBMCH.

The "mass resignations" don't have any legal validity as no doctor has quit the service individually.

In JGMCH, 19 doctors signed the resignation letter.

“If the demands of junior doctors remain unfulfilled, we will make further moves which can affect the healthcare services in the state-run medical colleges. Our students have been sitting on a hunger strike for four days, yet the state government is silent,” said a senior doctor.

Additional reporting by our Jalpaiguri correspondent