Chief Minister Eknath Shinde’s Medical Assistance Cell may be helping people, but the Kalyan Dombivli constituency, where his doctor son Shrikant Shinde is Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha), is facing a gross scarcity of doctors at its government hospital. The state-run Central Hospital in Ulhasnagar has 70 per cent posts of doctors vacant. It is the same hospital where a doctor allegedly refused to deliver the baby of an Adivasi woman, which led to the foetus dying in the womb.

Patients are being forced to run from pillar to post for treatment due to the lack of doctors at the Central hospital. During a visit, mid-day found that only five of 16 posts of doctors were filled. The hospital is dependent on ‘on-call’ doctors, who people said are unavailable during an emergency.