UK-based Indian doctors claim victimization, appeal to PM Modi

UK-based Indian doctors have launched a campaign against “victimisation of black and minority groups” and have appealed to India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi to raise the issue when he visits the country later this year.

Professor Narinder Kapur, a visiting professor of neuropsychology at University College London, has written to a group of Indian-origin parliamentarians seeking support on the “victimisation of BME (black and minority ethnic) doctors in the UK”. The British Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (BAPIO) and British Indian Doctors Association (BIDA) have backed her campaign.

“Over the past few years, we have had to support a number of Indian doctors who have found themselves in this sad and distressing situation, often having to face kangaroo courts in NHS (National Health Service) Trusts, with huge financial expenditure on all sides,” says the letter, co-signed by BAPIO president Dr Ramesh Mehta and BIDA president Dr Sabyasachi Sarker.

A number of British-Indian MPs, including Valerie Vaz and Alok Sharma, have responded to her campaign, and said they will be holding a series of meetings on this matter over the next few weeks.

Prof Kapur highlighted that many of Indian doctors had an India passport and family, and they suffered by extension. This issue is expected to figure on the agenda during Mr Modi’s visit to London later this year, as it had a direct impact on India. In addition, the Indian government should also put pressure on the British government to take strict measures in this regard.

The campaign group has compiled evidence of 10 such cases where Indian-origin medical staff, most of them senior consultants, had to suffer. He said he had suffered “bullying and lies” when he raised concerns over the presence of unqualified staff, following which an independent mediator awarded him 20,000 pounds compensation for the distress he went through.According to a recent report on how whistle-blowers in the UK’s state-funded NHS are treated, unaccountable managers protect themselves and undertake biased investigations, character assassination, suspensions, disciplinary and dismissal of staff who had an exemplary work records; all on the basis of one’s colour and ethnicity.

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