The fresh focus on the role of police following today’s hearing of the Kolkata hospital rape-murder case in Supreme Court has escalated the BJP demand for the dismissal of the city’s police chief Vineet Goyal. Chief Minster Mamata Banerjee has played for time. The police chief, she said, cannot step down immediately in view of the coming Durga Puja, which calls for special stress on law and order. 

“Kolkata Police Commissioner has come to me several times last week and offered to resign,” Ms Banerjee said.  “We have pujo coming up. Someone who is aware of law and order has to be there. If you have patience for a few days, will it be a Mahabharat (big deal)?” she added.

Following the arrest of Sandip Ghose, the former Principal of RG Kar Medical College, the next big demand of the protesters has been the resignation of the police chief. The Opposition parties have thrown their weight behind it. 

The role of the police in the investigation of the young doctor’s rape-murder has raised multiple questions. The woman’s parents have claimed they cremated their daughter’s body under pressure from the police and alleged that a police officer had offered them money to bury the incident. 

There have been complaints about videography and questions why the body’s postmortem was done at RG Kar hospital, which created a conflict of interest of sorts.

The 14-hour delay in filing of the First Information Report has been flagged multiple times, including by the judges of the Supreme Court.

Today, the top court said a key document connected to the postmortem appeared to be missing. 

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud questioned where a certain challan was, that showed what articles of clothing and personal use was submitted for forensic examination. Without that challan, a postmortem cannot be carried out either, he said.

“See the third column on the top, the constable (who brought the body) is supposed to carry this (form). It has been struck off. So there is no reference of this challan when the dead body is sent for examination. You need to explain. If this document is missing, then something is amiss,” said Justice JB Pardiwala, who was part of the three-judge bench.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who was representing the state, could not immediately locate it and has sought more time.  

The Central Bureau of Investigation or CBI has said “who collected the samples” for forensics has emerged as a crucial question.

India on Monday reported its first confirmed case of “travel-related” Mpox, or monkeypox, in a young male who tested positive for a strain from western Africa.

The patient is in stable condition, the government has said, and is without systemic illness or comorbidities, having already been isolated over the weekend on suspicion of carrying the virus.

There is no indication of any widespread risk to the public at this time, the government said.

The government explained that testing had confirmed presence of ‘clade 2’ of the virus, and that the particular strain is “similar to 30 cases reported earlier in India, from July 2022 onwards”.

The strain of infection, however, is “not a part of the current public health emergency (declared last month by the World Health Organization), which is regarding ‘clade 1’ of the Mpox virus”.

READ | New Mpox Strain Mutating Very Rapidly. How Scientists Are Responding

A ‘clade’ refers to a biological grouping that refers to all evolutionary descendants of a common ancestor or, in this case, a particular strain of virus.

READ | India’s 1st Mpox Case? Centre Says Man Isolated, No Cause For Alarm

Earlier today the Union Health Ministry issued directives to state governments “review public health preparedness, particularly at health facility level at state and districts by senior officials”.

This should include briefing healthcare workers, “especially those working in skin/STD (sexually transmitted disease) clinics, about symptoms, differential diagnoses, and action to be taken following detection of a Mpox case”.

READ | “Prevent Undue Panic”: Centre’s Advisory To States On Mpox

But it is “crucial”, the government also said to guard against “undue panic…”

Also, to ensure information about Mpox and its common symptoms is available to the public, the government referred to the latest WHO update, which indicates that a majority of patients are men aged 18 to 44, and present with rash (systemic or genital) followed by fever.

And the most commonly reported mode of transmission, the government said, is sexual contact, followed by person-to-person non-sexual contact.

Last month the who declared Mpox a PHEIC, or Public Health Emergency of International Concern, based on the risk of spread of the current outbreak from beyond Africa, where a surge in cases has been reported from the Democratic Republic of Congo and other nations like Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda. There is also a new strain from the DRC, scientists said.

Five cases have been reported from Pakistan’s Peshawar, according to Geo News.

READ | Pakistan’s Peshawar Is Mpox ‘Epicentre’? Tally Reaches 5: Report

According to the WHO, so far over 120 countries have reported Mpox cases from January 2022 to August 2024. There have been over 100,000 lab-confirmed cases and around 220 deaths.

READ | Serum Institute Says Working To Develop Monkeypox Vaccine

The WHO says a vaccine can help prevent infection and can also be administered after a person has been in contact with someone who has Mpox. “In these cases, the vaccine should be given less than four days after contact (and) can be given for up to 14 days if the person has no symptoms…”

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