Two more doctors have been arrested for allegedly abetting the suicide of a junior colleague by tormenting her with casteist slurs at a state-run hospital in Mumbai, taking the total number of those arrested in the case to three, police said on May 28.



While one doctor, Bhakti Mehere, was arrested on May 27 after initial interrogation, the two other accused - Hema Ahuja and Ankita Khandelwal - were absconding. "Ahuja and Khandelwal were arrested in the early hours of May 28 by the Agripada police in central Mumbai," a senior police official told PTI.

They will be produced in a court on May 28, he added. The three were booked after their junior colleague Payal Tadvi at B Y L Nair Hospital, Mumbai committed suicide at her hostel last week, a senior police official said. Tadvi, 26, hanged herself at her room last May 22 following which her family alleged that the doctors taunted her by ragging and hurling casteist abuses as she belonged to a Scheduled Tribe.

Protesters from the Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi and other Dalit and tribal organisations earlier held protests outside the hospital. The accused have been booked under relevant provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, the Anti-Ragging Act, the IT Act and Section 306 (abetment to suicide) of the Indian Penal Code.