The Supreme Court has taken suo motu cognisance of the alleged rape and murder of a postgraduate trainee doctor at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Calcutta, and will hear the case on August 20.

According to the cause list of August 20 uploaded on the apex court website, a bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra is scheduled to hear on Tuesday a matter titled 'In Re: Alleged rape and murder incident of a trainee doctor in RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, Kolkata and related issue'.

The alleged rape and murder of the junior doctor in a seminar hall of the state-run hospital has sparked nationwide protests.

The body of the postgraduate trainee with severe injury marks was found inside the seminar hall of the hospital's chest department on August 9. A civic volunteer was arrested by the Kolkata Police in connection with the case the next day.

The Calcutta High Court on August 13 ordered the transfer of the probe into the case from the Kolkata Police to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which started its investigation on August 14.

The high court had ordered transfer of the probe to the CBI while hearing petitions, including the one moved by the victim's parents praying for a court-monitored probe.

Observing that the mob violence in RG Kar Medical College and Hospital was an absolute failure of state machinery, the high court had on August 16 directed the police and the hospital authorities to file affidavits on the situation there.

The high court had said it was hard to believe that the police intelligence did not have information about the gathering of 7,000 people, when the state's lawyer told the court that a mob of such a number had assembled at the hospital in the early hours of Thursday.