Kolkata PGT doctor death: TMCP axe on 'red-shirt' doc after RG Kar presence audio goes viral
Times of India | 3 September 2024
Avik De (left), police had claimed the man in red was a fingerprint expert but IMA Bengal said he was Avik De (right) KOLKATA: The Trinamool students' union on Monday suspended Avik De, the first-year PGT doctor at SSKM surgery department, following allegations of his presence at the R G Kar crime scene on Aug 9. The 'suspension with immediate effect till the probe', as announced by TMCP president Trinankur Bhattacharjee, comes in the wake of IMA Bengal doctors identifying De as the man in a red t-shirt among those standing near the victim's body, as seen in a leaked video.The TMCP step flies in the face of cops' insistence the man in red shirt is a fingerprint expert.
What may have also led to the TMCP decision is an audio clip, in which De is purportedly heard bragging about his presence at the crime scene. Sources said the hour-long audio was a recording of his address to Burdwan Medical College students on Aug 11. Sources said a student recorded his lecture. TOI accessed the audio clip in which a man, claimed to be De, is heard saying he was at RG Kar on Aug 9 right after the body was found. He claimed to have seen the entire CCTV footage and that the civic volunteer was the only person involved in the crime.
TOI tried to contact De but he did not respond.
Burdwan Medical College junior doctors and students gheraoed the college council members, demanding De and other doctors allegedly part of 'North Bengal lobby' be barred from the campus. The gherao was on till last report came in.
After questions were raised on the presence of unauthorised persons at the crime scene and photos of it appeared, KP identified the man in a red shirt, standing in the cordoned-off area, as a fingerprint expert and that no one beyond the probe team was present. But a day later, IMA Bengal said it was De. "On Aug 11, De visited Burdwan Medical College and called 100-odd students to the lecture hall, where he said he was at the crime scene from the beginning of the probe," said a junior doctor. "He dropped CP and CM's names, trying to convince us about a fair probe. He said Sandip Ghosh was innocent. He tried to persuade as well as intimidate us not to join the agitation."
An alumnus of North Bengal Medical College, De was an RMO-cum-clinical tutor at the Burdwan college till he got the SSKM seat. IMA has questioned the allocation of this seat under the service quota.