RG Kar scam: CBI gets tip-off about Sandip Ghosh’s ‘influential connection’ through its mobile phones and laptops

Kolkata, September 29 (IANS): CBI officials probing the financial fraud at RG Kar Medical College & Hospital have traced crucial clues to the “influential connection” of its former and controversial principal Sandip Ghosh from his two mobile phones and two laptops.

Besides mobile phones and laptops, some similar clues were also found from the desktop in Ghosh’s office at RG Kar College and the paper documents seized there, sources familiar with the development said.

According to sources, the investigations so far have revealed a three-stage connection in the RG Kar financial case, with the first stage involving these politically influential patrons of Ghosh who made him so desperate.

While Ghosh and his extremely close associates were at the second level of the case, the third and final level involved those contractors and suppliers of RG Kar who were extremely close associates of Ghosh.

Sources added that the parallel investigation by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has identified some money trails in this case too, confirming this three-tier nexus in the case.

While the CBI’s investigation into the RG Kar financial irregularities case is being led and monitored by the court, ED had made a suo motu entry in the matter after filing an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR).

Sources added that both investigative agencies have identified a pattern in the modus operandi of the case, which involves manipulating the tendering system for awarding contracts or work orders and getting infrastructure-related works done illegally by outsourced agencies rather than the state public works department Selling biomedical waste from the hospital in open markets and smuggling organs of unidentified bodies that arrive at the hospital mortuary.

The investigators have also identified the role of a number of shell companies set up to carry out money laundering in the case, which is quite similar to the school jobs and food distribution case in West Bengal.