In ward no 6 of surgery, Narendar Dev, who met with an accident is not able to find the doctor. For the last nine days, another patient, Sher Singh Parihar of Doda, finds the doctor coming to the ward only once or twice during the night.

“We are left to the mercy of God,” grumbles, Kanta, an attendant with one of the patients in the ward.

In this hospital, where doctors have often been accused of negligence and with this hospital frequently witnessing the quarrels between the doctors and the attendants, doctors not attending to duties at night is another thing leaving the hospital crippled.

So when the senior doctors can't come to the hospital for a round during the night, doctors in this hospital virtually leave the patients to the mercy of God.

“It is the senior and the junior resident doctors only who handle this hospital. So with no check of senior doctors, the doctors are careless in their duties,'' said, Sources, adding, `` consultants and other senior doctors come only if a patient faces a major complicacy.

However Medical Superintendent of the hospital, Dr Ramesh Gupta, said “doctors attend to the duties as per the duty roster. We have the shortage of doctors due to which one doctor has to oversee the functioning of more than one ward. Due to this the doctors can’t remain in one ward only, he said.

“Senior doctors can’t attend to the duties during the night as this doesn’t happen even in the other hospitals outside the state,” he added.

“The senior doctors come on a call and the most senior doctor will come last. The resident doctors make a call to them,” said sources.

Admitting that it was not possible to carry out the frequent checking of the hospitals during the night, GMC Principal, Dr Rajinder Singh, said that the doctors who are posted at the GMC are efficient to deal with the situation.

“We have put in place a system which is one of the most efficient ones. We have set up a control room and if the patient doesn’t find a doctor, the people manning it trace the doctor. Also a team of doctors monitor the functioning of the hospitals during the night,” he added.