The descendants of Dr Radha Gobindo Kar or RG Kar the founder of the first private medical college in Asia are livid at the goings on in the RG Kar Medical College.
"Just a few days ago we celebrated the 172nd anniversary of Dr RG Kar who was not only a doctor but a great philanthropist who had selflessly served the countrymen during the 19th century great plague and subsequently set up the Asia's first private medical college … and now what we are seeing … it was not expected at all … it hurts not only us but the great soul of Dr Kar," said Swagata Ghosh one of the descendants of Dr Kar.
"I felt a cold horror just imagining what the poor victim, the lady doctor had to go through moments before her death … is this because my great, great grand uncle made this college … hopeless … but things were not like that … things have deteriorated in the past a few years otherwise we have known this college to be one of the best in India and for sometime the best in the eastern India," another relative at Betor in Santragachi area of Howrah from where Dr Kar belonged said.Radha Gobinda received his degree in medicine from Edinburgh in 1883 after pursuing studies at Calcutta Medical College. He returned to Calcutta three years later and immersed himself in treating poor patients of the country for free and, subsequently set up the medical college in 1886 without taking any support from the colonial British rulers.
He with the help of Dr Mahendranath Banerjee, Dr Akshoy Kumar Dutta, Dr Bipin Behari Moitra, Dr ML De, Dr BG Banerjee, Dr Kunda Bhattacharya and numerous others, founded the Calcutta School of Medicine which subsequently became a Government college after Independence and was named RG Kar Medical College.
"Such was his dedication that running short of funds he would even stand outside the houses of the rich people organising wedding ceremonies and seek funds from them … and now see what they have done to this College," he says adding "this is all the result of dirty politics and vested interests.
"Till recently this college was ranked 19th in rank among the best colleges of South-East Asia and today you see what has happened to this college … this must stop and the citizens must do something to save this medical college," said Arindam Das another descendant from Howrah.
"I cannot believe that the College our alma mater has degenerated to this level …. When the dead bodies are sold, organs are allegedly traded and other rackets are run including extortion of money from the students in the name of making them pass their exams … this is horrible ... that we could have even imagine in our wildest of dreams," said Dr Sibabrata Banerjee one of the alumni of the college.
