SSKM complaint against admission fraud

KOLKATA: The SSKM hospital has lodged a complaint with Bhowanipore police on Saturday after it came to light that a fake hospital admission racket had duped an elderly Regent Estate couple of Rs two-lakhs promising them admission in the hospital’s Woodburn Ward. The racket had also used fake letter heads and seals of IPGME&R director Manimoy Bandopadhyay and medical superintendent Raghunath Mishra.
According to the complaint, Ranjan Kumar Basu, 70, a retired vigilance officer of the erstwhile state electricity board, had been suffering from cardiac related complications for the past two-months. To make matters worse, Basu a resident of Pallyshree in Regent Estate had been bed ridden for the past weeks. Basu’s wife Sabita had appealed to the CMO for help. On a letter of recommendation from the CMO, Basu was earlier treated in NRS Medical College hospital. He was recommended for admission in the SSKM hospital for a pacemaker implant.

It was around this time weeks back, one Biswarup Ghosh – a distant relative of the couple – offered to make things easier for them. In three instalments, he took Rs two-lakh from the elderly couple promising them that the entire sum would be refunded by the hospital. To prove this, he produced letters and recommendations from the top SSKM management. When Ghosh kept failing dates, Sabita took her husband in an ambulance to SSKM hospital with all the letters. It was then the hospital authorities realised the fraud. Basu was admitted to the cardiology ward for treatement. Professor Mishra, the medical superintendent and vice-principal, later lodged the police complaint. Police said Ghosh is yet to be arrested.