300 PG Medicos Quit Maharashtra Hospitals Yearly: Report Exposes Severe Doctor Burnout
The medical fraternity is reeling after a devastating investigative report by Dainik Bhaskar went viral on social media this week, exposing the horrifying ground reality of postgraduate medical training in Maharashtra.
The Grim Statistics
According to the report, roughly 300 resident doctors are abandoning their PG seats in Maharashtra’s government medical colleges every single year. The primary cause? Extreme physical and mental exhaustion stemming from continuous, illegal 24 to 36-hour shifts.
Even more tragically, the intense academic and clinical pressure has been linked to 25 reported medico suicides in the state over the past few years.
“This is Exploitation, Not a Calling”
Following the report’s release, the United Doctors Front (UDF) took to X (formerly Twitter) to strongly condemn the systemic failure. The UDF labeled the forced 36-hour shifts as outright “exploitation,” demanding to know when the administration would stop normalizing the deaths of those trying to save lives. Junior doctors from hospitals in Nashik and other districts confirmed the reports, citing months of uninterrupted 20 to 30-hour duties with barely an hour or two allocated for sleep and meals.
A Massive Policy Shift: The Government Steps In
In a major update just yesterday (April 2), the mounting public pressure finally forced the state government to act. Taking note of the crisis, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis officially directed all medical colleges across Maharashtra to strictly enforce the Centre’s 1992 Residency Scheme.
This decades-old directive explicitly mandates that resident duty hours must be capped at a maximum of 12 hours per stretch and 48 hours per week. Maharashtra is now the first state to actively order the strict implementation of this specific scheme to curb medico burnout. However, residents remain skeptical about whether college deans and hospital administrations will actually honor this directive on the ground.
