The health minister threatened strong action against the striking doctors for jeopardizing the lives of patients and said that alternative arrangements were being made for adequate deployment of doctors in hospitals.
Describing the strike as unfortunate and unnecessary, Chaube said that the doctors should have taken into account patients before launching the strike.
Bihar State Health Services President Ajay Kumar claimed that 2500 permanent and 1500 contractual doctors have gone on strike.
The demands included parity in salaries and allowances with doctors in central government services, regularization of service of contractual doctors, security for doctors in hospitals and strengthening of the health directorate and infrastructure.