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‘Just 17 women left at campus’: Kolkata rape-murder spread fear in RG Kar Hospital
Several women doctors of the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata have left the campus amid gripped fear after the rape and murder of a junior doctor.
Several women doctors of the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata have left the campus amid fear after the gruesome rape and murder of a junior doctor inside the hospital premises on August 9.
According to the junior doctors, barring the nursing hostel, almost all other hostels at the medical college have been deserted, reported The Indian Express.
One of the students at the RG Kar College and Hospital told The Indian Express that there were around 160 junior women doctors living on the campus before the incident. However, only 17 women are left at the hostel now.
“After August 9, students started to leave the campus. Some returned a couple of days later. But after the attack on the hospital by miscreants on the night of August 14, more students, especially the girls, left,” a student said, as quoted by the media organisation.
The nurses, who are still at the campus, said that while they are scared but they have no option. According to the report, there are two nursing hostels on the campus - both of which are almost full.
“Even after such scary incidents, we are doing night duties and sometimes we find ourselves alone in a ward. We are now really feeling unsafe,” a nurse said.
Also read: Kolkata doctor’s gruesome murder raises questions on civic police volunteers
On the night of August 14, a mob entered the RG Kar Hospital campus – where protests against the rape and murder of a trainee doctor were underway – and wreaked damage to the demonstration site, vehicles and public property. They also vandalised the hospital's emergency department, nursing unit, and medicine store and damaged CCTVs.
Following the incident, a large number of women doctors left the campus.
According to senior advocate Aparajita Singh, out of the nearly 700 resident doctors, only about 30-40 women doctors and 60-70 men doctors were staying on the campus after the vandalism incident.
Kolkata rape-murder case
The body of a 31-year-old trainee woman doctor was found in a semi-naked state in the seminar hall of RG Kar Medical College on August 9. According to the police, the incident took place between 3am and 5am.
The autopsy report of the victim indicated that the woman was sexually assaulted before being strangled and smothered to death. According to the probe, after severely hurting and sexually assaulting the doctor, the arrested accused, identified as Sanjoy Roy, killed her by throttling and smothering her.
The gruesome incident sparked widespread outrage and led to protests within and beyond the medical community across the country.
Meanwhile, the CBI on Thursday got permission from a city court to conduct the polygraph test on the former principal and four doctors of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, with whom the victim allegedly had dinner before being found dead the next morning.
