The Association of Health Service Doctors (AHSD) in the state has written to the controller of examinations of the West Bengal University of Health Sciences (WBUHS), seeking transparency and corrective measures for various medical exams scheduled for the next couple of months.

Utpal Bandyopadhyay, the general secretary of the state AHSD sent the letter on Thursday.

“We have expressed genuine concerns in ample instances before your office regarding the uninterrupted decay of the rich heritage and standards of medical education,” reads the letter signed by him.

“In the letter, it has been specifically said that the WBUHS should take immediate steps to confirm no anomalies in the evaluation process of the exams. Also, exams should be conducted transparently as there had been reports of malpractices and manipulations orchestrated by a section of junior doctors and some office bearers,” said a member of the state AHSD based in the North Bengal Medical College & Hospital (NBMCH).

After the brutal rape and murder of the junior doctor at RG Kar hospital in Calcutta on August 9, a section of junior doctors in NBMCH, the oldest and largest state-run medical college in north Bengal, had resorted to protests. They had confined the principal and some other office bearers, alleging that some junior doctors had acted at the behest of Avik Dey, a former postgraduate student in SSKM Hospital whose name figured in the RG Kar incident, to resort to exam malpractices.

Dey used to be present at the examination hall and make calls to people conducting the exams, they had alleged.

The protests had prompted Sandeep Sengupta, the dean of student affairs, and his deputy, to resign.

In the letter, the state AHSD general secretary said that even chief minister Mamata Banerjee had expressed her anguish on the issue.

“At the last meeting with the chief minister, the junior doctors had explicitly mentioned that a section of people, who are working as house staff now, cleared the exams by resorting to unfair means. It is high time that the varsity (WBUHS) takes corrective measures to ensure that the quality of medical education is maintained in the state,” said a senior faculty member of the NBMCH.