Luxury car crash in Pune: Doctors arrested and suspended for tampering with accused’s blood samples

On a day when the luxury car accident case was developing rapidly, the Maharashtra government on May 29 sent the dean of Pune’s Sassoon General Hospital on compulsory leave over the disgrace that the hospital’s doctors had tampered with the blood samples of the 17-year-old whose drunken driving had led to the two deaths in Kalyani Nagar on May 19.

Dr Vinayak Kale, dean of Sassoon, was sent on compulsory leave after a three-member panel set up by the Eknath Shinde-led Mahayuti government to investigate the blood sample tampering case submitted its report to the administration. The government order sending Dr Kale on compulsory leave said the dean did not take the matter of tampering of the accused minor’s blood samples by Sassoon’s doctors “seriously enough”.

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Dr. Chandrakant Mhaske, the Dean of the Ahilya Devi Holkar Government Medical College in Baramati, has been given additional charge of the Sassoon General Hospital.

Dr Kale’s dismissal came hours after the former dean held a press conference where he informed that the Sassoon Hospital administration had taken action against the arrested doctors – Ajay Taware, head of the government hospital’s forensic medicine department, and chief medical officer Dr Shrihari Halnor – as well as staff member Atul Ghatkamble.

Dr Kale informed that the hospital administration had submitted the request for suspension of Dr Taware to the state government immediately after his arrest, while the services of Dr Halnor, who was on temporary assignment, were terminated on May 28 and Mr Ghatkamble was suspended.

This is the second time in less than a year that Sassoon Hospital has suffered disgrace: last year, then-dean Dr Sanjiv Thakur was removed from his post after drug lord Lalit Patil fled the hospital and there were reports that hospital staff were running a drug ring on the premises.

Meanwhile, the accident case continues to haunt the political spectrum, with the name of MP Sunil Tingre of the ruling Ajit Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) being mentioned more and more loudly in connection with the matter.

According to police sources, the accused teenager’s arrested father called the deputy no fewer than 45 times after the May 19 accident in an attempt to persuade Mr Tingre to “influence” the course of the case.

It is already established that Mr. Tingre, MP from Vadgaon-Sheri constituency (which includes Kalyani Nagar), was present at the Yerwada police station after the accident, where the minor was taken.

Mr Tingre has vehemently denied that he was trying to put pressure on the police, but both the opposition Congress party and his own party have called on him to clarify the matter.

Speaking to reporters today, Dr Kale had spoken of Tingre’s connection with Dr Ajay Taware and claimed that Maharashtra Medical Education Minister Hasan Mushrif and Mr Tingre had written a letter urging that Taware be made the head of the Department of Forensic Medicine at Sassoon Hospital.

The investigation also revealed that the arrested father had called Dr. Taware at least 14 times on May 19 after the accident, which subsequently led to the exchange of the accused’s blood samples.

In parallel, the Ministry of Women and Child Development has set up a five-member committee to investigate whether the juvenile court members followed proper legal procedures when granting bail to the teenager involved in the car accident.

A public uproar was triggered when the JJB granted bail to the accused minor barely 15 hours after the incident and asked him to write a 300-word essay on road accidents.

“The committee has been appointed and has started its work. A report is expected next week and once the report is out, I will also comment on it and submit it to the Maharashtra government for further action,” said Prashant Narnawre, commissioner of the women and child development department in Pune.