Leaders of both the Trinamool Congress and the BJP have continued to heap scorn and criticism on junior doctors, challenging the legitimacy of the widespread protests that erupted following the rape and murder of
the trainee doctor here on August 9.

On Thursday, agriculture minister Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay termed the doctors’ protest as a “Naxalite movement”, backed by the CPM.

“The doctors’ movement was hijacked by Naxalites and the CPM, with the BJP failing to even make a dent,” the Trinamool leader said at Haroa in North 24-Parganas.

Chattopadhyay went on to accuse the protesting doctors of neglecting their duties, citing an incident where an accident victim had allegedly died for lack of treatment.

“The state spends lakhs to train a doctor, yet they abandoned their duties to join this movement. How was the protest financed? Food was lavishly provided, with crores in donations going to 11 accounts. What sort of movement are they running, and for whose benefit?” asked the minister.

He accused the doctors of patronising “dalal raj” —a network of middlemen — and said some were involved in arranging hospital beds and cabins through intermediaries for a fee.

“If you visit any major hospital, middlemen hover around, offering beds and access to doctors,” Chattopadhyay added.

Despite warnings from chief minister Mamata Banerjee and Trinamool’s second-in-command Abhishek Banerjee, some leaders of the ruling party had attacked the doctors and their supporters with increasingly harsh language.

Last month, Mamata had advised TMC leaders against attacking the protestors, particularly the medical community. Abhishek Banerjee reinforced this stance, urging restraint. Yet, prominent Trinamool figures, including Kunal Ghosh, Partha Bhowmik, Debu Tudu, Narayan Goswami, Tapas Chatterjee, Debanshu Bhattacharya and Swapan Debnath, openly ignored those directives.

In Sandeshkhali, BJP leader Dilip Ghosh on Thursday labelled civil society protesters as “urban gentlemen” disconnected from the struggles of rural, marginalised women.

“In RG Kar’s case, urban elites agitated for justice, holding candlelight vigils. But when poor, rural women were in distress in Sandeshkhali, they received no such solidarity,” Ghosh said at a community Kali Puja event on the Sunderbans island.

Responding to the allegations, a trainee doctor involved in the movement said: “These accusations only strengthen our resolve. We are protesting precisely to address issues like the middleman system that affects patient access to care. The state is responsible for dismantling such networks, not the doctors. Misleading the public and questioning our funding won’t deter us.”

Another junior doctor said: “If transparency is the concern, why don’t these leaders implement a system to display bed availability in hospitals? Raising questions about our financial integrity feels ironic, coming from figures mired in numerous controversies.”