RG Kar Hospital rape-murder: Day after rehab, angry Calcutta HC sends 'powerful' principal on 'long leave'
Times of India | 14 August 2024
Protest at CNMC against Ghosh’s appointment KOLKATA: Calcutta High Court, expressing its shock at the outgoing RG Kar principal's "power" and his rehabilitation "within four hours" of his resignation on Monday, ordered him to go on leave and told Bengal govt on Tuesday that he could not be made the principal of Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital till it next heard a bunch of related PILs three weeks later.
"Let him be at home," Calcutta HC Chief Justice T S Sivagnanam said during the hearing in the first half, forcing Sandip Ghosh to apply for a 15-day leave that was immediately approved by the state health department. The HC again heard the case at 3pm, when the sequence of events narrated by the lawyers of the four petitioners prompted a livid HC to issue the order on the former RG Kar Medical College and Hospital principal.
Ghosh, under intense pressure since the brutal rape and murder of the RG Kar postgraduate trainee doctor, told the media on Monday morning that he was resigning from the college principal's post. Four hours later, however, another order came from the health department, rehabilitating him as the principal of Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital.
Ghosh has been under scrutiny at RG Kar for some time, with multiple allegations of corruption and nepotism levelled against him by a cross-section of the campus. His speedy transfer to CNMC added to the medical fraternity's rage on Monday and, till the HC order came on Tuesday, this campus, too, saw sustained protests by students and doctors.
Calcutta High Court CJ Sivagnanam, who was hearing the petitions on Tuesday along with Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya, had some strong posers for Ghosh and state govt.
"If the principal stood down taking moral responsibility, why should he be rewarded? No man is above law," the CJ said, expressing his astonishment at Ghosh being "such a powerful person that (he) stepped down and was rewarded within four hours with another position".
Sandip Ghosh is “virtually the guardian of the doctors who are working there and, if he does not show any sympathy or empathy, then who else will? He should be kept at home,” Calcutta HC CJ TS Sivagnanam told senior state standing counsel Amitesh Banerjee.
“Your client should not be working anywhere. Let him be at home. He is so powerful that a govt counsel is representing him,” he added, addressing Ghosh’s counsel, and then asked Ghosh “to go on a long leave”. “We give him an option to submit his leave application today by 3pm, failing which an order will be passed,” the CJ added, asking for his Monday’s resignation letter and his letter of rehabilitation.
State assembly opposition leader Suvendu Adhikari’s lawyer also drew the court’s attention at Ghosh’s attempt at “victim-blaming”, prompting the CJ to say it was a very serious matter.
The HC division bench noted that Ghosh did not file any formal complaint with the police, which allowed the gruesome rape-murder case to be first registered as an “unnatural death case”. “It is not like you found the body on the roadside.
The superintendent or the principal could have been the complainant,” an angry bench said. It also did not escape the HC’s notice that Ghosh’s subordinate had called the family twice and, in the second instance, said the woman had died by suicide. The police, too, chose not to record Ghosh’s statement.
The RG Kar assistant superintendent made two phone calls to the parents, first saying that she was ill and asking them to rush to the campus. The second call said it was a case of suicide.
“It is rather disheartening to know that the hospital administration, more particularly (former) principal Ghosh, was not proactive. It is on record that Ghosh resigned. (Then), in the shortest possible time, he was made principal of CNMCH.
It is difficult to comprehend (why) state govt did not exercise two options that were available: accept or refuse. The least that was expected from a responsible authority was to immediately relieve the principal from his duty and not assign him any other duty of equal responsibility,” the HC order said.