NEW DELHI, May 15: Hospital patients waited hours and some were forced to cancel surgery as emergency rooms in New Delhi struggled with skeletal staff during a strike protesting expanded quotas for disadvantaged students.

The strikers, mainly medical students and junior doctors, had some clashes with police, but others set up makeshift dispensaries outside hospitals to help patients who needed urgent treatment.

The students are protesting against government plans to require top colleges and universities to set aside 50 per cent of their admission seats in engineering, medicine and management for disadvantaged students. That would more than double the current quota of 22.5 per cent. The demonstrators say the lucrative spots at elite institutions should be awarded on merit.

“Our protest is not meant to harass patients but to pressure the government to roll back its plan,” said student leader Nirupam Jha at New Delhi’s All-India Institute of Medical Sciences. Hundreds of doctors staged a hunger strike at the institute to protest police action against students in 3 cities.

—AFP