RG Kar case: SC dismisses plea of ex-principal challenging HC order

The Supreme Court on Friday, 6 September dismissed a plea filed by former principal of Kolkata's RG Kar Medical College and Hospital Sandip Ghosh challenging the Calcutta High Court order dismissing his plea to be added as a party to a petition alleging financial irregularities at the institute during his tenure.

On 23 August, the high court ordered the transfer of the probe into the alleged financial irregularities from a state-constituted Special Investigation Team (SIT) to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

A bench of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said as an accused Ghosh has no locus to impleaded in the plea.

"As an accused you have no locus to intervene in the PIL, where the Calcutta high court is monitoring the investigation," the bench said.

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

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

The high court's 23 August order had come on a petition by former deputy superintendent of the facility, Akhtar Ali, who had requested a probe by the Enforcement Directorate into alleged financial misconduct at the hospital during the tenure of Ghosh.

The high court had also dismissed Ghosh's plea to be added as a party in the petition, holding that he was not a "necessary party" in the matter.