Kolkata (TIP)- Enforcement Directorate (ED) officers on Friday conducted simultaneous search operations at the houses of Sandip Ghosh, the former principal of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, and three of his associates in connection with alleged financial irregularities at the institute, an officer said.
The raids were carried out at Ghosh’s residence in Beliaghata and at two locations in Howrah and Subhasgram. All four are already in CBI custody.
“We reached these places around 6.15 am and started our raids,” the officer told PTI. The ED has filed an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) against Ghosh.
On August 23, the Calcutta High Court ordered the transfer of the investigation into the alleged financial irregularities at the hospital from a state-constituted Special Investigation Team (SIT) to the CBI.
The decision followed a petition by Dr Akhtar Ali, the former deputy superintendent of the facility, who sought an investigation by the ED into multiple allegations of financial misconduct during Ghosh’s tenure.
Ghosh served as principal from February 2021 to September 2023. He was briefly transferred from RG Kar in October 2023 but was reinstated within a month. Dr Ali had raised concerns that the corruption at RG Kar hospital might be linked to the doctor’s death, suggesting that the victim was aware of the misconduct and might have threatened to expose it.
Twist in Kolkata doctor rape-murder case, parents claim ‘police tried to bribe us’
The family members of the trainee doctor, who was allegedly raped and murdered at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata last month, on Wednesday alleged that the police tried to suppress the case by hurriedly cremating the body of their daughter. The victim’s father also alleged that the Kolkata Police also tried to bribe them with money.
“The police, from the very beginning, tried to hush up the case. We were not allowed to see the body and had to wait at the police station while the body was taken for post-mortem examinations. Later, when the body was handed over to us, a senior police official offered us money, which we immediately declined,” news agency PTI quoted the victim’s father as saying.
The victim’s parents further demanded justice for their daughter while participating in a protest at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital along with junior doctors.
On August 9, the body of the 31-year-old trainee woman doctor was found in a semi-naked state in the seminar hall of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital. A day after the incident, the Kolkata Police arrested the main accused, Sanjay Roy, after he was seen entering the building around the estimated time of the crime in a CCTV camera footage, and his bluetooth headphones were found near the crime scene.
The probe revealed that after severely hurting and sexually assaulting the doctor, Sanjay Roy killed the victim by throttling and smothering her.
A week after the incident, the Calcutta High Court handed over the probe to the CBI. Days after the incident came to light, massive protests erupted across the country, with people, including doctors, demanding justice for the victim. On Sept 3, a delegation of junior doctors in Kolkata presented a hand-made artificial spine to city police commissioner Vineet Goyal and demanded his resignation over the alleged lapses in the case. The action was a way to ask the police to “grow a backbone”.