RG Kar financial fraud case: Health Department to initiate probe against two doctors

KOLKATA — West Bengal Health Department will initiate a departmental probe against two senior doctors and members of the medico-academic faculty of state-run R. G. Kar Medical College & Hospital based on the recommendations of the CBI, investigating the multi-crore financial irregularities in the institution.

Sources aware of the development said that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had forwarded a communique to the state Health Department recently stating that both these doctors were within the ambit of the probe in the financial irregularities case and that the state government should also start a departmental probe against both of them.

Both these doctors, sources added, are attached to the Medicine Department of the said hospital.

The sources said that the State Health Department has acknowledged receipts of the communication from CBI, and in the reply, had given a positive signal to initiate a departmental probe into the matter.

The CBI and Enforcement Directorate (ED) were conducting parallel probes in the financial irregularities case. While the CBI probe is court-directed and court-monitored, the ED has made a suo motu entry after filing an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) in the matter.

The main charges in the financial irregularities case were manipulation in the tendering process, getting infrastructure-related work at R. G. Kar done by outsourced private agencies bypassing the state Public Works Department, smuggling of bio-medical wastes of the hospital and selling of organs of unidentified bodies in the R. G. Kar morgue.

Five persons, including the former principal of R. G. Kar Sandip Ghosh, were being tried in the financial irregularities case.

The CBI was also conducting a parallel probe against Ghosh in connection with the rape and murder of a junior doctor of R. G. Kar. The body of the victim was found on August 9.