The trainee physician at the RG Kar Medical College in Kolkata passed away 21 days ago. The lawsuit made its way from the city court to the High Court and ultimately the Supreme Court, revealing how the college and TMC administration handled the horrible rape-murder case improperly. The first three calls to the victim’s parent’s details have now been made public. Remarkably, the parents were asked to get to the hospital as soon as possible in the first two calls, but they were only told of the death in the third.
According to accounts, the victim spoke with her mother the evening before the tragic event at approximately 11:30 p.m. The intervening night of August 8 and August 9 saw the victim’s death.
The parents of a rape victim were horrified by three phone calls that they received on August 9 morning, all within thirty minutes of one other. In court, they said that the first call came in at 10:53 a.m. The assistant superintendent of the hospital answered the phone. Although the schedule that the Kolkata Police submitted to the Supreme Court attests to the fact that the official spoke with the parents during this period, it omits specifics of the exchange. Three audio recordings show that three different calls were made, the last of which informed the parents of their daughter’s death. The police records only mention one call.
When the parents contacted the first time to find out what had happened to their daughter, all they were told was that she was in critical condition and would be called to the hospital shortly. It was explained to the parents that only the doctor would know what had happened to her. She identified herself as the assistant superintendent and not a doctor when they enquired about the caller. That their daughter had been admitted to the emergency room was communicated to the parents.
Not too long after, there was another call, this time from a male voice. The caller instructed the victim’s mother to speak with the head of the hospital’s chest department before enquiring about her status.
The parents were told during the third call that their daughter may have taken her own life. The same Assistant Superintendent who had gotten in touch with them earlier made this call. She reminded the parents that the police were at the hospital and asked them to come in right away. The mother sobbed when she heard the heartbreaking news.
The Calcutta High Court and the Supreme Court have both focused a great deal of attention on the manner in which the hospital administration interacted with the victim’s parents. The parents filed a case with the high court alleging that they were made to wait for three hours and suspected that the wait was intentional.
On the other hand, Kolkata Police contests this story. Their chronology states that the parents arrived at the hospital at 1 pm, and ten minutes later, they were brought to the lecture hall, where their daughter’s body was found. Concerns have also been voiced by the courts regarding why the police launched an investigation into an unnatural death while the hospital administration, led by Dr. Sandip Ghosh at the time, chose not to file a formal police report. It was not until later that evening, after the victim’s father had formally complained, that a FIR was filed.
