Senior IPS officer Manoj Kumar Verma took over as the Kolkata Police Commissioner on Tuesday after the Mamata Banerjee government removed Vineet Goyal from the post, meeting a key demand of the protesting junior doctors in the state.
A 1998-batch IPS officer, Verma was the ADG and IGP (Law & Order) in his last assignment. Goyal was, meanwhile, made the ADG and IGP of West Bengal Police's Special Task Force (STF).
Goyal, a 1994-batch officer, was under fire over the rape and murder of a junior doctor at the RG Kar medical college hospital in the state capital. The decision to remove him from the top cop’s post was taken after a meeting between the protesting doctors and Chief Minister Banerjee at her residence on Monday night.
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A 42-member delegation of the doctors agreed to talk to the chief minister after the government agreed to their demand for a signed copy of the minutes of the meeting. Earlier, they had turned down four times the government invitation for a dialogue after the latter rejected their demand for a live-streaming of the meeting.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition seeking the resignation of Chief Minister Banerjee in the wake of the rape-murder incident and the ensuing protests in the state.
"We are not here to see what you feel about a political functionary. We are dealing with the specific grievances of the doctors. If you ask me to direct that CM should resign that's not part of our remit," the top court told the petitioner.
West Bengal has been witnessing widespread protests by junior doctors and medical students ever since the body of the 31-year-old trainee doctor was found at the seminar hall of the RG Kar hospital on August 9. A civil volunteer has been arrested in the case.
The CBI, which took over the probe following a directive by the Calcutta High Court, has arrested former principal of the RG Kar medical college Sandip Ghosh in connection with a separate corruption case, while Abhijit Mondal, the officer-in-charge of Tala Police Station, was taken into custody for allegedly tampering with evidence and delaying registration of the FIR.