The West Bengal Junior Doctors’ Front has given a call for a “mega rally” on the day of Mahalaya that will start at a College Square and end at Esplanade to demand justice for the 31-year-old postgraduate trainee who was raped and murdered in RG Kar Medical College and Hospital on August 9.

The junior doctors gave the call on Friday evening from the SSKM Hospital auditorium where a mass convention was organised.

The rally will start from 1.30pm on Wednesday (Mahalaya), a junior doctor said.

The junior medics also called for gatherings and vigils across Bengal at 6pm on Sunday, ahead of the Supreme Court hearing on Monday.

Aniket Mahato, a junior doctor at RG Kar, said they had called for the Mahalaya rally as they feel that “real justice is yet to be served as the real perpetrators of the crime are yet to be arrested and the motive has also not been ascertained yet”.

“We want to clarify that the reason why we hit the streets and started our cease-work was for the young doctor who lead brutally raped and killed inside her own workplace. The probe needs to be fair and we are expecting a fast trial as well. This is the primary reason why we will walk on Mahalaya,” he said.

Rumelika Kumar, another junior doctor, said they had given the call for protest meets on Sunday evening ahead of the Supreme Court hearing.

“This is a people’s movement and we had received feedback from many saying that they wanted to be on the roads doing something to ensure that the heinous crime committed against a woman is not forgotten,” she said.

On Sunday, in many localities, protesters will form human chains, have candlelight vigils and street plays, she said.

Reclaim the Night

Organisers of Reclaim the Night have called for vigils on the eve of Mahalaya to protest the rape and murder of the young doctor and demand a speedy probe and trial.

At least 20 places across the city will have people occupying the streets.

The first such call was for the night of August 14, when thousands of women and men took to the streets following a social media campaign initiated, among others, by Rimjhim Sinha, a 29-year-old social science researcher.

On Friday, Sinha told Metro that they called for the vigil this time as the movement to seek justice “must not fade out”.

“A lot remains to be achieved. We want the exact truth to come out and the perpetrators of not only the crime but everyone who tried to hush it up to be punished for their actions,” Sinha said.

The vigils will be held at several key places, including College Street, Jadavpur 8B bus stand, the Academy of Fine Arts, the airport’s number 1 gate crossing and Madhyamgram.