New Delhi: Trinamool Congress leader Jawhar Sircar, who resigned as Rajya Sabha MP on Sunday, said that the recent incident related to the rape and murder of the Kolkata resident doctor in RG Kar hospital and the movement that followed is a wake-up call for West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
Speaking exclusively to News9live on Monday, Sircar said, “People in the state have high expectations of Mamata Banerjee. Having worked with her for three years, I can say she is completely pro-woman. However, I disagree with her that entire protests in the state and outside over the incident are political. While the BJP is doing some politics in the matter, but the movement after the incident is spontaneous. I request the chief minister to wake up and not allow West Bengal to be taken over by communal forces.”
“I have sympathy for her. The wrong people surround her. On the 13th or 14th of August, before the incident took place, I had called for the suspension of RG Kar Hospital’s then-principal Sandip Ghosh. The Government has to take exemplary action to restore public confidence in it. It cannot go on with the transfer of the guy to another good hospital. This was the biggest blunder of the whole incident.”
‘CM Mamata Banerjee surrounded by wrong people’
Further talking about the incident, he said, ”Kolkata was in terrible turmoil over this incident. People in the city took this incident very badly. The rape in itself is a very horrendous incident to happen. But this one seemed to have triggered a volcano. I thought things would be normalised in the next two or three days as it happens. However, it didn’t after four days of the incident. After this, the CBI took over. The problem is the bad handling of the case in the first place. I had some experience in the administration. We handled some bad cases in the past. What stands out is the credibility of the administration. There is a total lack of faith in the administration among the people after the incident.”
There should have been transparency: Sircar
When asked about how the parents of the victim were first misguided on the case of the death. He said, “An incident like this should have gone straight to the police commissioner and the home secretary. Am not aware how much they were involved. The first thing that should be done in such cases is to bring in transparency. There is a standard operating procedure on what to do under such cases.”
