ISLAMABAD, Nov 7: Health Minister Ejaz Jhakrani has decided to probe the beating up of two doctors in a city hospital as the agitation by the doctors over the incident continued to grow and threatened to cripple government-run hospitals in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

Members of the Doctors’ Action Committee agitating the issue said on Friday after meeting Health Secretary Sulaiman Ghani that the official told them that the minister would visit the scene of the incident, the Federal Government Services Hospital (FGSH) on Tuesday to know the facts and decide whether a judicial inquiry was needed.

The action committee had gone to the health secretary to demand a judicial inquiry as it felt that police deliberately made a weak case against the accused as they belonged to the family of a deputy secretary of the National Assembly.

“That is how the culprits could secure bail from a court in an otherwise non-bailable offence,” the action committee members stated at a press conference.

They dismissed the counter FIR filed by the accused against the FGSH staff as untenable.

“On the very day of the incident, the accused had submitted a written apology to the hospital administration owning their highhandedness against the doctors," one member asserted.

Meanwhile, the doctors' agitation continues to gather momentum.

A delegation of the Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) on Friday assured the action committee of its complete support and said its members would join the two-hour strike the committee had decided to stage in all hospitals from Saturday.

A lawyers’ delegation also met the action committee to express solidarity with the striking doctors.

Hundreds of doctors and paramedic staff of the government hospitals in the twin cities have been agitating against the assault on their two colleagues for six days.

On Friday, some 400 doctors and paramedics of the FGHS went on complete strike. All hospital departments remained closed throughout the day, except emergency, operation theatre, ICU and CCU.

Doctors from the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) and CDA Hospital of Islamabad and Holy Family Hospital, District Headquarters Hospital and the Benazir Bhutto Hospital of Rawalpindi also participated in Friday's protest. They assembled at the auditorium of FGSH and then took out a procession half way to the Parliament House.

On Saturday they intend to march up to the parliament building.

They chanted slogans and carried banners and placards bearing their demands for action against the accused who had assaulted Dr Rifat Pasha and Dr Ali Ahmed Khan for refusing to administer an unregistered vaccine to a granddaughter of a deputy secretary of the National Assembly.