At least four top officials of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, including new principal Suhrita Paul, were removed by the health department on Wednesday evening in deference to the demands of the protesting junior doctors.

The appointment of former RG Kar principal Sandip Ghosh, during whose tenure a junior doctor was raped and murdered at the facility, as the principal of Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital was also cancelled and his extraordinary leave of absence sanctioned.

“We have removed four officials of RG Kar Medical College and Hospital from their posts as demanded by the junior doctors. We have met all their demands,” Narayan Swaroop Nigam, Bengal health secretary, told The Telegraph on Wednesday evening.

However, the protesting doctors said their demands had only been met partially and the cease-work was continuing. The doctors said they were seeking justice for the victim and the arrest of “all the culprits” involved in the August 9 atrocity.

“They (the protesting doctors) are demanding that the new principal of the hospital is shifted, they are demanding a new MSVP (medical superintendent-cum-vice-principal), they are also demanding the head of the chest medicine department is removed
and the then assistant superintendent,” Nigam said while leaving RG Kar on Wednesday night.

“For the sake of normalcy, the government is serious that normalcy returns, that the health services at RG Kar run normally. Security arrangements have been made. All officers are good, we are giving a team of new officers here,” Nigam said.

Nigam added: “Whatever their demands were, we have handled them from the administrative side. As per their demand, the extraordinary leave of the then principal of RG Kar is (sanctioned). We have now fulfilled all their demands. We called their representatives, we spoke with them over phone. We want normalcy to return. We want normal work to resume at RG Kar.”

Earlier in the afternoon, the junior doctors met senior health department officials at Swasthya Bhavan, demanding the removal within an hour of some senior officials who were posted at RG Kar when the crime happened. The protesting doctors had organised a rally from the CGO Complex in Salt Lake, which houses the office of the CBI, to Swasthya Bhavan in Sector V.

In the evening, a team of senior health department officials led by Nigam went to RG Kar. They held talks with the protesting doctors and informed them about the decision to remove the four officials. Along with principal Paul, the health department also shifted out of RG Kar Bulbul Mukhopadhyay, the medical superintendent and vice-principal who was the dean of student affairs during the crime, along with two other officials.

Sources said that after the afternoon meeting, health officials discussed the demands and took the decisions. “We are expecting the junior doctors to return to work since all their demands have been met,” said Nigam.

However, the protesting doctors said there were several other demands that were yet to be met.

“This was one of our important demands. But our main demand is justice for the doctor who was raped and murdered and the arrest of all the culprits involved. We have also demanded that the CBI divulge information on the progress of the probe,” said Aniket Mahato, a postgraduate trainee at RG Kar who is one of the leaders of the protest.

“On Thursday, the Supreme Court will hear the case again. We are looking forward to what the CBI says there,” Mahato said.

A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud had asked the CBI during the first hearing of the suo motu case on Tuesday to file a status report on the progress of the investigation on Thursday.

Ghosh resigned as principal of RG Kar on August 12 and was appointed principal of Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital within hours. The next day, Calcutta High Court asked Ghosh to go on long leave and questioned the “tearing urgency” with which he was sent to National Medical College and Hospital.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court had questioned the Bengal government’s counsel on Ghosh’s reappointment: “When the conduct of the principal is under scrutiny, how was the same principal appointed as a principal of another college immediately?”

After the Swasthya Bhavan meeting on Wednesday, a junior doctor said: “We had come to Swasthya Bhavan not demanding justice because the (Supreme) court is looking after the probe. We came here to know what is Swasthya Bhavan’s response to our demands that some officials of our medical college, the principal and the MSVP have to resign and that they cannot be appointed in any other administrative post in any hospital.”

“We told the officials that they had an hour to respond. But they did not give any response after an hour and we came out,” said the doctor.

Many of the doctors were wary that the protest outside the hospital was drowning out their main demand for a proper investigation and the arrest of the culprits.

The doctors said they had no control over what was being said outside the college but their demands remained unchanged — the arrest of all culprits, adequate safety and security for all healthcare workers and not appointing the RG Kar officials under their lens to any other healthcare facility.

The junior doctors said though the CBI was handed over the probe on August 13 by the Calcutta High Court, the central agency has not said anything about the progress of the investigation.