CBI questions TMC MLA Sudipto Roy over Kolkata doctor's rape-murder, ED conducts raids

Kolkata: The Central Bureau of Investigation on Thursday questioned a legislator of the ruling Trinamool Congress in connection with the probe into the rape and murder of a doctor at R G Kar Medical College and Hospital run by the government of West Bengal.

The officials of the Enforcement Directorate also conducted raids at several places in and around Kolkata on Thursday, continuing the probe into the alleged corruption and financial misconduct at the RGKMCH, particularly during the tenure of its former principal Dr Sandip Ghosh, who was already arrested by the CBI.

The ED officials raided the office of a company, which supplied medical equipment to the hospital, at Kalindi in Kolkata as well as the residence of a businesswoman – wife to a close associate of Dr Ghosh and owner of entity that got the contract to run a cafeteria at the RGKMCH – in Tala.

The CBI on Thursday questioned Trinamool Congress’s member of the Legislative Assembly, Dr Sudipto Roy, in connection with the rape and murder of a postgraduate trainee doctor inside the seminar room of the Department of Chest Medicine of the RGKMCH on August 9.

Dr Roy, who himself is a medic, heads the Patients Welfare Committee of the RGKMCH. The CBI officials went to his residence at Sinthi on the northern outskirts of Kolkata and questioned him in connection with the rape and murder of the doctor.

“The CBI officers had come to ask me some questions about the death of a student at the RGKMCH last month. I cooperated with them,” said Roy, who was elected to the state assembly from Serampore in Hooghly.

Just a day after the 31-year-old postgraduate trainee doctor was found raped and murdered on the third floor of the RGKMCH, the Kolkata Police arrested one of its contractual staff, Sanjay Ray, for the crime. The CBI on August 14 took over the probe and the custody of Ray on August 14 but so far did not arrest anyone else in connection with the rape and murder.

The incident and the outrage over it also brought to the fore the allegations of rampant corruption at the RGKMCH.

Dr Akhtar Ali, a former deputy superintendent of the RGKMCH, had moved the Calcutta High Court, seeking an investigation by the Directorate of Enforcement of the Union Ministry of Finance into the allegations of corruption and irregularities at the 138-year-old institution, Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj of the High Court on August 23 ordered the CBI to take over the probe from the Special Investigation Team, which Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s government had constituted in the wake of the allegations by protesting doctors against Dr Ghosh and his close associates.

The central agency on September 2 arrested Dr Ghosh, who was the principal of the college when the incident took place. Three others, including the personal security officer of Dr Ghosh, were also arrested by the CBI. The ED too joined the probe into misappropriation of funds by Dr Ghosh.

The ED teams on September 6 raided the seven premises, including the residence of Dr Ghosh, his close relatives and associates, under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002 in connection with the probe into the alleged misappropriation of funds by him. The agency officials found documents relating to a flat in Murshidabad, three flats and two houses in Kolkata, as well as a farmhouse owned by Dr Ghosh and his wife Dr Sangeeta Ghosh. Several other incriminating documents and digital devices belonging to Dr Ghosh were seized during the search.