Will call CBI if police can’t nail Kolkata hospital killer by Sunday: Mamata
West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee set a 6-day deadline for police to solve the rape and murder of a junior doctor in Kolkata, threatening a CBI probe if unresolved.
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday fixed a six-day deadline for the city police to solve the rape and murder of a junior doctorat one of Kolkata’s best-known hospitals amid mounting outrage over the grisly crime that has prompted countrywide strikes.
Banerjee said that her government will ask the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to take over the probe into the August 9 crime at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital if the police cannot crack the case by Sunday, responding to the main demand of the opposition parties and student protesters.
“I want the police to arrest the culprits. There are some insiders. If the police can’t solve the case by Sunday then we will give it to CBI. We have nothing to be bothered about it. However, the rate of success in CBI investigations is very poor,” said the chief minister.
“They could not recover (Rabindranath Tagore’s) Nobel Prize medallion that was stolen (in 2004). They could not solve the murder of Tapasi Malik in Singur (in 2006). But we will hand over the case for the satisfaction of those asking for it,” she added.
Her comments came on a day RG Kar principal Sandip Ghosh resigned from his post and government service. “I cannot take this insult anymore. All the allegations raised against me are false and fabricated. A student movement has been incited to remove me. There is a political mind behind this,” Ghosh said in his resignation letter.
{{/usCountry}}Her comments came on a day RG Kar principal Sandip Ghosh resigned from his post and government service. “I cannot take this insult anymore. All the allegations raised against me are false and fabricated. A student movement has been incited to remove me. There is a political mind behind this,” Ghosh said in his resignation letter.
{{/usCountry}}His departure follows the earlier removal of the medical superintendent-cum-vice-principal Sanjay Vashisth, who has been replaced by Bulbul Mukhopadhyay, the dean of student affairs.
{{/usCountry}}His departure follows the earlier removal of the medical superintendent-cum-vice-principal Sanjay Vashisth, who has been replaced by Bulbul Mukhopadhyay, the dean of student affairs.
{{/usCountry}}The body of the woman, a second-year postgraduate student who was allegedly raped and murdered inside a seminar hall of the hospital, was found on Friday morning. The crime took place at the third-floor seminar hall of the chest department late on Friday night and police later said that multiple lacerations and wounds were found on her body.
{{/usCountry}}The body of the woman, a second-year postgraduate student who was allegedly raped and murdered inside a seminar hall of the hospital, was found on Friday morning. The crime took place at the third-floor seminar hall of the chest department late on Friday night and police later said that multiple lacerations and wounds were found on her body.
{{/usCountry}}A 31-year-old civic volunteer with the police, Sanjay Roy, was arrested on Saturday in connection with the case and was sent to 14-day police custody.
A police official said late in the evening that three trainee doctors were being questioned. “It appears that they have some information about the victim’s last whereabouts,” the officer said.
Banerjee, who is also the state’s home and health minister, made the statements after meeting the victim’s family at their residence in North 24 Parganas district even as Kolkata was paralysed by a mass protest attended by prominent intellectuals, doctors, medical students and students from across the city. Similar strikes affected hospitals across the country as doctors called for better safety measures.
“Nurses were there. The hospital’s own security personnel were also there. I fail to understand how this happened. The (victim’s) parents told me somebody from inside was involved. The police will talk to everyone including the person who first called up the family and gave the news,” the chief minister said.
The victim’s father told the media on Saturday that the person who first called him did not give his name but identified himself as assistant superintendent of the hospital and said the 32-year-old woman had died by suicide.
Kolkata’s police commissioner Vineet Goyal, who accompanied the chief minister, echoed her. “We will question all those who were near the place of occurrence (of the crime). We have even given them a helpline number in case someone wants to talk to us anonymously.”
Banerjee also spoke about the resignation of the principal. “He tendered his resignation saying his children are getting disturbed by the media reports. However, we told him that he will be transferred to another hospital,” she said.
Government officials later in the day said that Ghosh will be posted as principal of Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital (CNMCH). This triggered protests at CNMCH. Medical students, who were already holding a demonstration, said they would not accept Ghosh as the principal. They even locked the principal’s chamber.
“Allegations of corruption are being raised against me because I always stood against corruption. A number of doctors are involved in financial malpractice. I stood against them firmly,” Ghosh told the media.
A two-member team of the National Commission for Women arrived in Kolkata even as politics over the crime peaked.
“Why is the investigation delayed till Sunday? We are not happy with the probe. Our demands are clear. We want a judicial inquiry into the matter and capital punishment for the culprits. The family of the doctor must be well compensated,” an agitating junior doctor who declined to be named told news agency PTI.
The Kolkata Police on Sunday intensified the probe to ascertain how Roy, the prime suspect, committed the crime and whether he had an accomplice. The security camera footage which led to Roy’s arrest indicated that the crime took place within a span of around 30 minutes, the investigators said.
“The nature of the multiple injuries found on the victim’s upper body may prompt anyone to suspect that Roy was not alone. He had no noticeable injury on his body which is natural in such cases because victims fight back. This leads to the suspicion that the sexual assault might have taken place after the murder,” a police officer said on condition of anonymity.
Samples collected from the bodies of the victim and the suspect have been sent for DNA tests to the Central Forensic Science Laboratory. The preliminary autopsy report was handed to the victim’s family on Sunday following Supreme Court directives in similar cases.
