Sandip Ghosh, former RG Kar Medical College and Hospital principal refuse lie tests
Telegraph | 19 October 2024
Former RG Kar Medical College and Hospital principal Sandip Ghosh, who had earlier undergone a polygraph test, has refused to take a narco-analysis test, CBI sources said.
Ghosh conveyed his reluctance to a judge at the Sealdah court, where the CBI produced him on Friday, sources in the agency said.
The CBI pressed for a polygraph test on Abhijit Mondal, the former officer-in-charge of Tala police station, after producing him in the court on Friday.
Mondal is unwilling to undergo the test, a CBI officer said.
It was on Ghosh’s watch that a junior doctor was raped and murdered at RG Kar on August 9.
The CBI lawyer told the court that the sleuths need to find out whether Ghosh and Mondal had conspired to try and pass off the doctor’s death as suicide.
The narco-analysis and the polygraph tests are required to find out more about the alleged conspiracy of the two, the central investigating agency told the court.
Following the CBI appeal, the judge summoned Ghosh and Mondal separately to record their statements on whether they were ready to undergo the tests.
CBI sources said the two refused to undergo the tests.
Senior officers said that in a narco-analysis test, the accused is injected with drugs such as sodium pentothal to induce a hypnotic state. The idea is that the accused will speak the truth in such acondition.
In a polygraph test, physiological responses like blood pressure and pulse beat are checked while the accused answers questions.
In September, Sanjay Roy, the prime accused in therape and murder, had refused to undergo a narco-analysis test.
Ghosh had earlier undergone a polygraph test. The CBI arranged for the polygraph test in the presence of forensic experts. Sources said the results were inconclusive.
During Friday’s hearing, the counsel for Ghosh and Mondal sought bail for their clients.
“Before my client reached the crime scene, several others had. It’s not clear yet why he has been arrested,” the counsel representing Mondal told the court.
Opposing the bail pleas, the CBI counsel said both the accused were influential persons and their release could influence the course of the probe.
After listening to both sides, the judge remanded Ghosh and Mondal in judicial custody till November 4.
Autopsy doctor
A team of CBI officers on Friday questioned Apurba Biswas, a professor in the department of forensic medicine and toxicology at RG Kar, in connection with the post-mortem on the rape-and-murder victim.
Biswas was the senior-most doctor in the three-member team that conducted the autopsy. The post-mortem report mentions multiple bruises on the junior doctor’s body.
The other two board members were Rina Das, from Biswas’s department at RG Kar, and Molly Banerjee, from NRS Medical College and Hospital.
While Biswas is a professor, Das is an associate professor and Banerjee an assistant professor.