Kolkata doctor rape case: RG Kar Hospital's former principal, Sandip Ghosh's name, has surfaced in a 2017 sexual assault case involving a student male nurse in Hong Kong. A report has surfaced in which the 45-year-old Indian government doctor Sandip Ghosh has been accused of ‘patting the left buttock of the male nurse, and trying to touch their private parts’.
The CBI is probing Sandip Ghosh for alleged financial irregularities.
According to Hong Kong's daily news media My News report, Sandip Ghosh had indecently assaulted the student nurse and asked him, “Do you like it?”
Mint could not independently verify whether Sandip Ghosh, mentioned in the Hong Kong case, is the former principal of RG Kar Hospital.
According to the report, Sandip Ghosh, an Indian government doctor, participated in a clinical attachment program in Hong Kong when the incident occurred. On April 8, 2017, at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Hong Kong's Kowloon, a student nurse accused Sandip Ghosh, an orthopaedic doctor, of sexual assault.
Ghosh claimed the situation was a misunderstanding, explaining that he accidentally touched a nurse's hip while demonstrating how to address a dislocated shoulder by pulling on his arm.
Denying the nurse's allegations, Ghosh recounted that he had said, "Do it like this.”
Sandip Ghosh pleaded not guilty to one count of indecent assault at the Kowloon City Court. Defence counsel David Boyton argued that the accusation was a "convenient excuse" for the nurse's tardiness and suggested a misunderstanding due to Ghosh’s accent.
The nurse admitted to being late frequently but denied any misinterpretation.
Sandip Ghosh stated he sought help for a recurrent shoulder dislocation that morning and claimed no ill intentions. Dr Wilson Li, a defence witness, confirmed that Ghosh had a history of shoulder dislocation, supported by his MRI scan and Indian medical records.
Asia Times reported that the Kowloon City magistrate's court acquitted Sandip Ghosh. “The magistrate accepted Ghosh’s explanation and his recurrent shoulder dislocation condition, and the misunderstanding that might have arisen due to the victim misinterpreting the defendant’s English accent,” the article stated.
The South China Morning Post noted that the case curtailed Ghosh's stay. “Due to the lawsuit, the hospital stopped his posting and therefore he actually only worked there for a few days,” the newspaper reported.
The West Bengal government-run RG Kar Hospital's former principal Sandip Ghosh has been under fire after a 31-year-old PG trainee doctor was raped and murdered at the medical institute on August 9.
The victim's parents have alleged that the hospital authorities had initially ruled out their daughter's death as ‘suicide’. The CBI has probed if Sandip Ghosh had orchestrated the manipulation.
RG Kar Hospital's former deputy superintendent, Dr Akhtar Ali, lodged multiple complaints of financial irregularities at the establishment during Sandip Ghosh's tenure as principal.
There have been allegations that under Sandip Ghosh’s leadership, organs from unidentified bodies sent to the hospital for post-mortem were frequently sold on the black market at a high price.
