An association representing beleaguered Indian doctors in London has filed an appeal in the appeals court of British High Court seeking a stay on a new immigration law abolishing permit-free training for overseas doctors, mainly Indians.
"Our solicitors have filed the plea in the appeals court seeking an injunction to stay the new immigration law and that pending a ruling, all Doctors should be treated equally," Ramesh Mehta, president of the British Association of Physicians of Indian Origin, told PTI on Monday.
He said the high court judge, Justice Stanley Burton, while declining to quash the Immigration law abolishing permit-free training for overseas doctors, had on Friday assured the BAPIO, the main appellant, that if it filed an appeal, it would be heard expeditiously.
"The appeal will also go before Justice Burton and we expect the hearing on the appeal will be very soon," Mehta said.
If the association fails to get a stay of the new immigration law, an estimated 15,000 Indian doctors and medical students in the UK will have to pack up their bags and return home as they faced the prospects of refusal of visa extension.
Mehta said the association has also launched an appeal to raise £100,000 to fight the legal battle.
"We have been getting a lot of support from doctors in the UK and overseas," he said.
Mehta also announced that a memorial service will be held in London on March 3 in memory of Imran Yousuf, co-appellant, who committed suicide recently as he was rendered unemployed and could not cope up with the situation.
The immigration law of April 3 last year stipulates that doctors from outside the European Union need a work permit to train in Britain. The department of health abolished the permit-free training in April last year in an attempt to streamline the recruitment process.
Indian doctors, who constituted one-third of the total doctors employed in the National Health Service, in Britain have been the backbone of the health service, but with the expansion of the European Union, doctors from EU countries get automatic jobs in UK as against Non-EU doctors who now need a work permit.
