Hundreds of doctors have protested near India’s health ministry as they demanded stringent laws to protect healthcare workers from violence and sought justice for their colleague who was raped and killed at a state-run hospital.

The protesting doctors — who were holding up placards like “Justice delayed is justice denied” — were stopped by the police as they tried to set up free outpatient services to patients outside the health ministry in New Delhi, part of demonstrations and rallies held for more than a week.

Doctors and medics across India have held protests, candlelight marches and temporarily refused to see non-emergency patients after the rape and killing of the 31-year-old trainee doctor on August 9 in the eastern city of Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal state.

The protesting doctors say the assault highlights the vulnerability of medics and healthcare workers in hospitals and medical campuses across India.

They are demanding stronger laws to protect them from violence, including making any attack on on-duty medics an offence without the possibility of bail, increase in security at hospitals and safe spaces for them to rest.

The government has asked doctors to return to duty and said it will set up a committee to look into their demands.

The rape and killing of the trainee doctor at Kolkata city’s RG Kar Medical College and Hospital has also focused rage on the chronic issue of violence against women and led to protests across India.

A police volunteer working at the hospital has been arrested and charged with the crime, but the family of the victim alleges it was a gang rape and more people were involved. Federal investigators are handling the case.

Thousands of people, particularly women, have also marched in the streets of Kolkata demanding justice for the doctor, saying her killing has highlighted how women in India continue to face rising violence despite tough laws following the gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old student on a moving bus in Delhi in 2012.

That attack had inspired politicians to order harsher penalties for such crimes, as well as the creation of fast-track courts dedicated to rape cases. The government also introduced the death penalty for repeat offenders.

Despite tougher laws, sexual violence against women has remained a widespread problem in India.

In 2022, police recorded 31,516 reports of rape — a 20% jump from 2021, according to the National Crime Records Bureau.