Financial irregularities: SC dismisses plea of ex-principal of RG Kar Hospital challenging HC order
New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Friday 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 August 23, 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 August 9. A civic volunteer was arrested by the Kolkata Police in connection with the case the following day.
The high court's August 23 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.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
