Chaos reigned supreme at Gandhi Hospital on Tuesday with senior doctors hailing from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh almost coming to blows on the issue of nativity. As a result, medical services, including outpatient, inpatient and casualty services, broke down with doctors from both sides deciding to boycott duties. The hospital management was left helpless, as both the sides stuck to their guns.

Trouble started on Monday, when doctors from the Telangana Government Doctors Association (TGDA), Gandhi Hospital unit, put-up posters that said ‘Seemandhra Doctors Go Back’ on the hospital premises. In the early hours of Tuesday, a few Andhra Pradesh doctors on the hospital’s fourth floor questioned the TGDA members about the posters.

“We asked them what was the need to put up such posters in the hospital? If the Government sends us notices to leave, then we will voluntarily go away on our own. We asked TGDA members not to create such uncomfortable situations on the hospital premises,” they said.

What started as a small argument, gradually became an uproar with doctors from either side arguing with each other. A lot of heckling between the two was witnessed and at one point, the doctors almost came to blows. Angry members of TGDA rushed to the chambers of Superintendent Ashok Kumar, demanding immediate action against the AP doctors. The TGDA members also staged a dharna and burned an effigy of the Kamalnathan Committee.

“There are 270 doctors at Gandhi Hospital out of which 136 are from A.P. Just to stay in Hyderabad, many of these doctors have submitted fake school study certificates. One of them manhandled a member of the TGDA,” Dr. P. Sravan Kumar, president of the TGDA, Gandhi Hospital unit, said.

Meanwhile, Director of Medical Education, Telangana, Dr. Putta Srinivas termed the incident unfortunate. “Bifurcation is already over and the process of separation has started. Distribution of employees will be taken up according to the guidelines and everybody should observe restraint.”