Kolkata, Jan 31
The West Bengal Medical Council is facing criticism from representatives of the medical fraternity on various issues. The council was recently accused of targeting a couple of junior doctors who had been at the forefront of the protests against the R.G. Kar rape and murder case.
The fresh criticism against the council is regarding payment of a monthly honorarium of Rs 50,000 to its three members despite the fact that the Bengal Medical Act, 1994 does not have any provision for such honorarium for any council member.
The second issue, which has already been recognised as justified by the Calcutta High Court on Thursday, is the continuation of Manas Chakraborty as the registrar of the council five years after the end of his tenure in that chair way back in November 2019.
On Thursday, the Calcutta High Court’s Division Bench of Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Hiranmay Bhattacharyya directed Chakraborty to step down by 5 p,m. on Friday, failing which, he would be removed by the court.
The third complaint against the council is how its top brass could honourably reinstate one particular doctor as a member of the council, who was suspended from it following accusation of fostering a “threat-culture” in the post R.G. Kar rape and murder scenario.
Council insiders pointed out that these were not just verbal complaints against a section of the top brass in the body, but also have been raised in subsequent communiques by other members of the council to the state health department since October last year when the entire state was boiling over the rape and murder tragedy.
However, the council president and Trinamool Congress legislator Sudipta Roy have so far maintained a total silence on such allegations.
Recently, the council came under strong criticism for slapping a show-cause notice on one of the faces of the junior doctors’ movement Asfaqulla Naiya, accusing the latter of conducting private practice as an ENT specialist without possessing the necessary degree for that.
A police investigation also started against Naiya. However, a single-judge Bench of the Calcutta High Court earlier this month had provided him with an interim shield against any coercive police action, including arrest.
At the same time, the council also started enquiring about another face of the movement Kinjal Nanda, a post-graduate trainee with R.G. Kar and more or less a popular face in the Bengal television serial and advertisement worlds.
The enquiry was how Nanda could pursue his acting and advertising career side-by-side with his assignment as a junior doctor attached with R.G. Kar.
