Filmmaker Aparna Sen demands adequate security for women at state hospitals

Kolkata, Aug 13 (PTI) Expressing solidarity with agitating junior doctors in state-run R G Kar Medical College and Hospital here, eminent filmmaker Aparna Sen on Tuesday questioned why police and hospital authorities had initially described the ‘rape’ and murder of the woman doctor as suicide to her parents.

Sen, also a prominent social activist, went to R G Kar Medical College and Hospital to meet the protesters amid slogan shouting by few self-proclaimed CPI(M) activists from north Kolkata near the gate calling her ‘a sycophant intellectual’ who had not raised her voice against the “savage attack on the young woman” previously and “woken up after five days for publicity,” but she did not react.

Sen told a gathering of students and media inside the hospital compound, “I am shocked to hear that civic volunteers can have unhindered access inside the hospital premises at midnight. I am shocked to hear a female health personnel has no safety and security inside the hospital. I am concerned about the safety of women.”

A civic volunteer was arrested on Saturday in connection with the alleged rape and murder of the woman doctor.

Sen said, “I have not been keeping well. But today I have rushed despite indisposition. As this is the time we all must stand together to lodge our protests against such attacks. We demand, there should not be a recurrence of similar incidents,” she said.

The veteran filmmaker wondered “why the parents of the woman doctor were initially told by the hospital authorities that she had died by suicide despite the discovery of her body with multiple injuries in the hospital. She was raped and killed in a brutal manner. Was there an attempt to hide the truth, to deflect focus from the incident? The role of police should come under the ambit of investigation.”

Supporting the demands of the students, she said “I am with them. The state has to ensure the security of doctors, including women. The state has to ensure the safety of every woman in Bengal.”

Singer Pallab Kirtania, who was present at the hospital compound along with Sen, said “The demand of judicial probe by the medics is justified. We are with them.”

Sen, Kirtania, rights activist Sujata Bhadra, and Miratul Nahar among others came to the hospital compound as part of the solidarity initiative by ‘Shilpi Sanskritik Kormi Buddhijibi Manch’, a platform of rights activists and artists.

Earlier the rally commenced from the Netaji Statue in Shyambazar crossing and arrived at the main gate of R G Kar Hospital.

The body of the postgraduate trainee doctor was found inside a seminar hall of the hospital on Friday morning. The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday ordered that the probe into the alleged rape and murder of the woman doctor be transferred from Kolkata Police to CBI.