Once again, thousands of ailing people from across the country will be deprived of treatment on Monday, with the Nepal Medical Association, the umbrella body of medical doctors, announcing a boycott of non-emergency services.

This time, the protest is against the Consumer Court’s recent verdicts, which slapped heavy penalties on doctors found guilty of gross negligence in treatments that resulted in serious complications and patient death.

This is the second time in two months that the association has called for a complete halt to non-emergency services at health facilities across the country. Earlier, in the last week of April, the association had instructed its member doctors to shun services to put pressure on private medical colleges to provide stipends on par with those offered by government-owned colleges.

On Sunday morning, the agitating doctors held one-hour sit-ins on hospital premises to show their disagreement with the Consumer Court’s verdicts.

As a symbolic protest, the association plans to collect photocopies of the Nepal Medical Council licence from its members on Monday, which will be returned to the Council’s office bearers on Tuesday.

“The situation has escalated in such a dramatic way that we can no longer continue our work smoothly,” said Dr Anil Bikram Karki, president of the association. “Doctors cannot pay millions of rupees in fines for trying to save lives, and our experience shows that authorities do not listen unless we resort to stern protests.”

Karki and other association members had earlier met Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and urged him to amend some provisions of the National Penal Code Act-2017 and the Consumer Protection Act-2018. “The prime minister had assured us to sort out the issue soon,” Karki said.

According to Karki, his association was forced to start a new protest programme because the Consumer Court continues to issue verdicts against hospitals and doctors.

In its recent verdicts, the court imposed heavy penalties on three private hospitals—Rs 5.68 million on the Chabahil-based Om Hospital (8 percent to the hospital and 20 percent to the doctors involved); Rs 5.7 million on Grande City Clinic (Rs 4 million to the doctors and Rs 1.7 million to hospital); and Rs 14.5 million on Himal Hospital (70 percent to the doctor and 30 percent to hospital).

“Halting hospital services and depriving ailing patients of treatment has become a major tool for the association to put pressure on the government to meet its demands,” said Jyoti Baniya, chairman of the Forum for the Protection of Consumer Rights-Nepal. “Without knowing what the Consumer Court’s verdicts actually say, the NMA and its member doctors are again depriving patients of treatment, which in itself is a serious crime.”

Depriving patients of treatment is against their constitutional right. As per the National Penal (Code) Act 2017, it can lead to imprisonment for up to three years or a fine of Rs 30,000.

“The details of the verdicts are yet to be made public, and they have already started punishing patients,” said Baniya. “Courts have long been issuing verdicts in cases of gross negligence and have also slapped fines against those found guilty.”

Consumer rights activists said that there is a serious case in the Consumer Court against the NMA General Secretary’s wife, also a doctor. They alleged that the association’s current protest aims to influence that case.

Experts, as well as former office bearers of the Nepal Medical Council, say boycotting treatment to protest against court verdicts cannot be justified under any circumstances.

“Patients and their relatives have the right to seek legal remedies if they feel they or their patients have been harmed due to medical negligence,” said a former office bearer of the Nepal Medical Council, asking not to be named, as he too is a doctor and the association is protesting. “The council’s investigations have shown sheer negligence by doctors, and actions have been taken.”

He added that doctors also have the right to challenge the Consumer Court’s verdicts in the High Court and the Supreme Court.

“Not all doctors are equally competent, and no doctor can guarantee there will be no negligence from their fellow doctors,” said another former council member. “Are we again encouraging the public to take the law into their own hands by depriving them of the right to go to court?”