Ima Ludhiana Condemns Police Action Against Student Protesters In Delhi; Demands Government Account For Lives Lost In The Neet-ug 2026 Crisis

Jul24,2026 | Gautam Jalandhari | Ludhiana

IMA LUDHIANA CONDEMNS POLICE ACTION AGAINST STUDENT PROTESTERS IN DELHI; DEMANDS GOVERNMENT ACCOUNT FOR LIVES LOST IN THE NEET-UG 2026 CRISIS
Punjab’s largest IMA branch writes to Union Home Minister · Warns of candle march and doctors’ protest march if no time-bound action follows

The Indian Medical Association, Ludhiana Branch — the largest branch of the IMA in Punjab, representing over 2,000 doctors — has strongly condemned the use of force by Delhi Police against unarmed students during the march to Parliament on 20 July 2026, and has called upon the Union Government to accept responsibility for the young lives lost in the aftermath of the NEET-UG 2026 paper leak and the cancellation of the examination.
A formal letter of protest has been addressed to the Hon’ble Union Home Minister, Shri Amit Shah, with copies marked to the Commissioner of Police, Delhi, the Hon’ble Chief Minister of Delhi, the National Human Rights Commission and the National Commission for Women.
The Association has described the conduct captured in widely circulated video recordings as “absolutely unacceptable, wrong and inhumane”, and has warned that failure to act will be met with public protest by the medical fraternity of Ludhiana.
Dr. Manoj K. Sobti, Patron, IMA Ludhiana, said:
“What this country watched on 20 July was not the maintenance of law and order. It was the State raising its hand against its own children. As doctors, we spend our working lives repairing what violence does to the human body. To watch uniformed officers inflict that damage on unarmed teenagers — many of them sixteen, seventeen, eighteen years old, many of them aspiring to the very profession we belong to — is not something the medical fraternity can be expected to witness in silence.”
“The recordings in which young women were struck, dragged and humiliated are, in our professional and human judgement, indefensible. No provocation, real or alleged, justifies what those visuals show. A police force that cannot restrain itself before a girl of seventeen has failed at the most elementary duty it exists to perform.”
“But there is a graver count still, and it did not begin on 20 July. Media reports have documented at least thirteen young lives lost to suicide in the weeks between the cancellation of NEET-UG 2026 and the re-examination. These are not private family sorrows to be quietly absorbed. They are the foreseeable consequence of a system that failed to protect its own question paper, and then left more than twenty-two lakh students suspended in uncertainty. The Government of India must own these deaths. Ownership is not a press statement. It is accountability, and it is reform.”
NEET-UG 2026, held on 3 May 2026, was voided by the National Testing Agency following allegations of a paper leak first traced to a coaching centre in Sikar, Rajasthan. More than 22 lakh candidates were affected. A re-examination was subsequently scheduled under heightened security, and a multi-agency investigation is under way. Student agitation over examination integrity has continued for several weeks, culminating in the march towards Parliament on 20 July 2026, on the opening day of the Monsoon Session, in which police used lathi-charge and tear gas. By official account, more than 170 persons — protesters and police personnel — were injured and over 100 protesters were detained. On 22 July, the Delhi High Court issued notice to the Union Government and the Delhi Police on petitions alleging disproportionate use of force, and directed that CCTV footage, videography and related records be preserved.
Dr. Pawan Dhingra, President, IMA Ludhiana, said:
“IMA is a non-political body and takes no partisan position on any question of politics. We have no interest in who governs. We have every interest in whether a seventeen-year-old can sit an examination without her paper being sold, and whether she can raise her voice about it afterwards without being struck by a man in uniform. That is not politics. That is medicine, and it is citizenship.”
“We note with satisfaction that the Hon’ble Delhi High Court has ordered the preservation of CCTV footage and videography of the incident. We urge that this material be placed before an independent authority without delay, and that every officer identifiable in it be brought to inquiry — irrespective of rank. Selective accountability will convince nobody and will heal nothing.”
IMA Ludhiana therefore demands:
1. An independent, time-bound judicial inquiry into the police action of 20 July 2026, with its findings placed in the public domain.
2. Suspension pending inquiry of every officer identifiable in the preserved footage, and strict action against those found responsible — irrespective of rank.
3. Immediate medical and psychological care for every injured student, with injuries formally documented and records preserved for the inquiry.
4. Acceptance of responsibility by the Union Government for the deaths reported in the wake of the NEET-UG 2026 cancellation, and ex-gratia relief and counselling support for the affected families.
5. A structural overhaul of examination security and the NTA, with a published, statutory timeline for reform — so that no future cohort is held hostage to an administrative failure.
6. A standing operating procedure for the policing of peaceful assemblies, including a categorical bar on male personnel physically handling women protesters.
Dr. Ashish Ohri, Honorary Secretary, IMA Ludhiana, said:
“Our letter to the Hon’ble Home Minister is the first step, not the last. If there is no credible, time-bound response, IMA Ludhiana will move from correspondence to the street — a candle march and a silent protest march by the doctors of this city, in coordination with IMA Punjab and our sister associations.”
“We would far rather light a candle in relief than in mourning. That choice now rests entirely with the Government.”
IMA Ludhiana stands in unqualified solidarity with the students of this country and with the Constitution of India. The Association has appealed to the medical fraternity nationally, and to IMA branches across Punjab, to add their voice to this demand.