Report by Badal Tah; Rayagada: In an incident of theft, Rayagada police have arrested three people, including former medical officer Dr. Rohit Kundu, who was working there at Urban Health Centre-1 in Ring Road, Rayagada within Rayagada Municipal Council area. Others arrested are lab technicians Abinash Sauanta and Debashish Garadia. In the context of the theft, the present medical officer Dr. Sangram Kishore Nimal filed a written complaint at the Rayagada police station. According to the FIR, the laptop, CCTV hard disk and some important office registers were missing.
Rayagada Police IIC Kamal Kant Basant Kumar Kahanr reached the spot and investigated the matter. The staff of the said health center were brought to the police station for interrogation. The police found out many important registers and files were thrown in a big hole in the premises of the said center. Suspecting the involvement of the health center staff in the theft case, the police were tracking and checking the mobile phones of all the staff from the time of preliminary investigation. In the past few days, the then Medical Officer Dr. Kundu, who was in charge of the health center, was questioned by a two-member team of the district health department for not coming to the health center regularly and not delivering proper health care to the patients. Subsequently, Dr. Kundu was transferred from there to the district headquarters hospital(DHH) and Dr. Nimal was given charge of the health center. After taking change, he reported the police & his higher authorities of theft.
Even though the CDMO had issued show cause notices to the then medical officer Kundu twice, there was no systemic improvement in the Health Centre. After being reported about the incident of disorder and theft of government files and valuables, the District Collector Parul Patwari immediately directed the CDMO to take strict action against the erring employees of the health center.
Nobody expected that Kundu as a working doctor was involved in the said theft. His father, who is also a medical doctor of eminence in the district and mother, an eminent social worker running a nursing home, are very well known in the district. Their doctor son’s menial activity has not at all been appreciated by local denizens. We must thank the upright police officer KKBK Kahanr, who did not bow down to power that be and forwarded the accused to the court.
