Kolkata:
It was just another morning at the middle class household in north Kolkata. The daughter who had made her parents proud by becoming a doctor and was studying further, was at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital for a long shift. Around 11.30 pm the previous night, she had called her mother and spoken to her, as always. Her mother did not prolong the call. She would have, had she known it was her last.
On the morning of August 9, three calls within half an hour shattered their little world and set them off on a fight for justice. As source has accessed the audio of the calls to the parents the morning after the 31-year-old doctor’s rape and murder at the Kolkata hospital. Their voices capture the shock and confusion two elderly parents endured long before reaching the hospital to find their daughter’s brutalised corpse.
The First Call
The parents of the rape-murder victim have told the court that the first call came at 10.53 am. The caller was a woman, who has since been identified as the Assistant Superintendent of the hospital. The Kolkata Police timeline submitted in Supreme Court says that the official called the parents at this time and “informed them”, but does not elaborate on the conversation. The cops’ timeline mentions only one call. The three audio files, however, reveal that three calls were made and it was only in the last call that the victim’s parents were told that she had died.
Victim’s Father: What has happened, please tell me
Caller: Her condition is very bad, please come as soon as possible
Victim’s Father: Please tell us what has happened
Caller: The doctor will say that, you come fast.
Victim’s Father: Who are you?
Caller: I am the assistant super, not doctor
Victim’s Father: There are no doctors there?
Caller: I am the assistant super. We have brought your daughter to the Emergency. You come and contact us.
Victim’s Mother: What happened to her, she was on duty
Caller: You come fast, as soon as possible.
The Second Call
In the second call, a male voice is heard. By then, the parents have already left for the hospital.
Caller: I am speaking from RG Kar (hospital)
Victim’s Mother: Yes, please say
Caller: You are coming, right?
Victim’s Mother: Yes, we are coming. How is she now?
Caller: You come, we will talk, come to RG Kar Hospital’s chest department HOD
Victim’s mother: Okay
The Third Call
It was in the third call that the victim’s parents were told she had died by suicide. This has come up repeatedly in court and judges have asked why the parents were misled. This call was from Assistant Superintendent, who made the first call.
Victim’s Father: Hello
Caller: This is the Assistant Super.
Victim’s Father: Yes
Caller: The matter is that your daughter has probably died by suicide. She is dead, police are here, we are all here, please come as soon as possible.
Victim’s Father: We are coming, right away
Victim’s Mother (screams in the background): My daughter is no more.
The hospital administration’s communication with the victim’s parents is one aspect of this horrifying incident that has repeatedly come under scrutiny in both the Calcutta High Court and the Supreme Court. In their petition in the high court, the parents said they were made to wait for three hours. They suspect that this delay was intentional.
Kolkata Police, however, has contested this. Their timeline claims that the parents reached the hospital at 1 pm and they were taken to the seminar hall, where the body was found, 10 minutes later. The courts have also questioned why the hospital administration, led by then principal Dr Sandip Ghosh, did not file a formal police complaint and the cops had to register an unnatural death case. An FIR was filed only late at night after the victim’s father filed a formal complaint.
As per source, the victim’s father had described the devastating moment when they saw her daughter’s body. “Only I know what I went through when I saw her. There were no clothes on her body. She was only draped in a bedsheet. Her legs were apart, with one hand on her head,” he had said.
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