Maj. Gen. sacked for abuse

http://www.deccan.com/home/homedetails.asp#Maj. Gen. sacked for abuse

New Delhi, Sept. 14: A serving Major General was dismissed from service by an Army court after it found him guilty of molesting a woman officer under his command — the first such case in the history of the country’s armed forces. Presided by the Army’s 10 Corps commander Lt. Gen. R.S. Sujalana, the General Court Martial delivered its verdict against Major General A.K. Lal on Saturday at Bhatinda.

Major General Lal was serving as the 3 Infantry Division General Officer Commanding in Leh last year when Capt. Neha Rawat, made a written complaint against the two-star General alleging sexual misconduct under the pretext of conducting meditation classes at his residence.  Major General A.K. Lal will lose his pension and ex-servicemen benefits, if the verdict is confirmed by Army Chief General Deepak Kapoor. Army sources said this is the most severe punishment handed to a serving general.  

City hospitals neglect poor

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Hyderabad, Sept. 14: Many poor people have been denied essential medical care in city hospitals in recent weeks.  There have also been incidents of abusive behaviour as well as negligence but authorities have not bothered to take action.  For instance, Mr Srinivas, a patient in Osmania General Hospital, was administered anaesthesia for surgery.

He was supposed to remain unconscious for two hours, but he regained consciousness within 30 minutes.  In another shocking incident, Sudhakar, a DMO in Fever Hospital, misbehaved with a 15-year-old girl in a drunken state. He was later suspended.  "It is really shocking and I personally feel very bad about this," said Dr P.P. Prasad, superintendent of Fever Hospital. "He has been here for a year."

Another inebriated doctor, who runs a private clinic near Pahadishareef in Cyberabad, reportedly stabbed a patient who visited him for consultation. Such horror stories occur once in a while, but the negligent attitude towards poor patients is a daily occurrence.  Recently, a 60-year-old diabetic, who came all the way from Mahbubnagar to Osmania General Hospital for treatment, was made to walk all around the hospital. Later he had to leave without getting treatment.

Last week, three-year-old Shahadzada Arshia, who was admitted to the Kamineni Hospital after she suffered an electric shock, was sent out after her anxious uncle peered through the ICU window, angering the duty doctor.  Her parents had to shift her to another hospital.  "The child was not given proper treatment and the hospital authorities also prepared a discharge certificate without asking us," said Mr Yousuf, the girl’s uncle.

Similarly, a couple of days ago, a severely ill HIV positive patient was denied admission by NIMS authorities and was finally admitted only after his family staged a dharna.  NIMS doctors were also alleged to have neglected a retired government employee, who died 10 days after being admitted to the hospital.

The nurse on duty even refused to check his temperature saying that the pathology department had no thermometer.  The casual way in which Gandhi Hospital staff disposes off syringes, including those used on HIV patients, also evoked much controversy recently.

Dowry charge filed against K’taka IAS officer, family

TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Muktsar: A criminal case was registered on Sunday against an IAS officer of Karnataka cadre, his parents and younger brother for demanding a Mercedes in dowry, showing cruelty to his wife and attempt to outrage her modesty. The IAS officer belongs to Hoshiarpur. Dr Preet Inder Kaur, a Muktsar resident posted as medical officer at a rural hospital, lodged the complaint with the police against her husband Ravneet Singh, a 2005-batch officer posted as assistant commissioner, Bidar in Karnataka. They got married on March 24, 2007. In her complaint to the police, Preet Inder Kaur alleged that despite her father, a doctor of Muktsar, spending over Rs 60 lakh on her wedding, she was being harassed from the very first day of her marriage for not bringing a Mercedes. As she declined to meet the demand, her husband never had conjugal relations with her, she alleged, accusing the younger brother of the bureaucrat of attempting to outrage her modesty. She alleged that her marriage was solemnized at Zirakpur, near Chandigarh, and besides jewellery and diamonds worth Rs 15 lakh, Rs 20 lakh in cash was given as dowry. “As I refused to meet their demand of a Mercedes, my husband got annoyed and left for Bidar 15 days after our marriage,’’ she said. The IAS officer’s father, however, rubbished the charges. “The allegations are a bundle of lies to tarnish the image of my family and my son. There was never a demand for dowry. Rather my son was subjected to mental harassment by his wife Dr Preet Inder Kaur,’’ he said.

90% Maharashtra medical graduates pay up, skip rural stint

Times of India

Mumbai: The list of medical graduates who passed out of the Grant Medical College attached to JJ Hospital at Byculla in 2007-’08 says the whole story: only three of the 109 students took up the mandatory government service. The rest paid Rs 1 lakh to break the state government’s bond that requires them to put in a year’s work in healthcare facilities in the state’s hinterland. The story is not unique to JJ Hospital. It’s being played out in the state’s 13 other governmentrun medical colleges as well, reveals data collected by the Youth For Equality under the Right To Information (RTI) Act. The state government’s ‘one year or Rs 1 lakh’ formula has obviously not succeeded in providing a steady stream of doctors for the rural healthcare system as it was meant to do. But it garnered over Rs 9 crore for the state coffers in bond money collection in 2006-’07, admits a senior official from the Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER), which oversees medical education. But simple arithmetic shows that with a student pool of 3,300 medical graduates every year, the sum could well be more than double. But YFE, which has been fighting against any increase in reservation in higher education, interprets these statistics differently. ‘‘The information shows that it is not only students from the general category who pay the bond money,’’ says YFE’s Saket Kumar. Most students from the reserved category — be they from the OBC, SC or ST who get 100% free education — also skip the rural stint, he adds. ‘‘The government asks students to put in a year of service in return for the subsidized medical education they avail of throughout the five years,’’ points out Saket. ‘‘Ministers have held that medical students in the open category enjoyed subsided education (approx Rs 23,000 each year) and yet dodged the rural stint, but now we know that even those in the reserved category and those hailing from rural areas do the same,’’ he adds. At present, reservation at the MBBS level is 50% (including 19% for OBC, 13% for SC and 7% for ST). Take the case of GSMC attached to KEM Hospital in Parel. Of the 108 students admitted in the open category in the 2006-’07 academic year, about 75 paid the bond sum; 42 of the 48 students in OBC category did the same; 19 of the 23 SC students paid; and 8 of the 12 in ST category did the same. The state’s director general of health services Dr Prakash Doke estimates that over 90% of the students don’t take up government service. Barely 5% to 10% of the 3,300 students every year remain with the system he says. Dr Sanjay Oak, dean of Nair Hospital, states that he has noted the paying-out trend in the last two years and has pointed it out to the DMER.

Man in West Bengal changes sex to marry partner, gets ditched

Thu, Jun 26 03:00 PM
Egged on by his gay partner to go for a sex change so that they could marry, a man undergoing the process found to his dismay that his partner showed no interest in him any more nor could he return to his original self now.
Feeling betrayed, Dipu Ghosh lodged a complaint to the police who are now looking for Ajit Mondal, Dipu's estranged partner, officer-in-charge of New Jalpaiguri Police outpost, Pankaj Thapa said in Siliguri on Thursday.
Dipu, a resident of Rangapani near Siliguri, alleged in the complaint that Ajit had convinced him to go for a gender change and get married. He has been in the process for the past three months but his counterpart was now avoiding him.
It was not not clinically possible for Dipu now to get back his original male form, albeit effeminate.
Ajit was absconding and his parents claimed to have no no knowledge of their son's homosexuality, Thapa said. They
say, it is a plot against their innocent 23-year-old son.
Dipu came in contact with Ajit two years ago and they developed a homosexual relation. Later, with the help of local eunuch community, Dipu went to Mumbai and started working as a bar-girl. He now earns a modest amount.
"Money is not not a problem for me. I am ready to give Ajit everything, a beautiful life.... (I'll) fulfill all his dreams. But he has no right to insult my love," he told a local television channel.

Man beheads wife for supporting sons

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Raipur: Infuriated by his wife’s stand to support their sons in a property dispute, a 70-year-old farmer beheaded her with a sickle on Sunday night, carried the severed head to the police station 5 km away and presented it to horrified cops.
The incident happened in Chhattisgarh’s Durg district. Durg SP Deepanshu Kabra said, “Jethu Sahu, a resident of Telibundra village under Ranitarai police station walked up to the police station and surrendered.’’
The couple’s two sons — Gopal and Soman had separated from their parents. While both the sons had received their respective shares of farmland, a portion of the house along with a huge courtyard was still in Jethu Sahu’s possession. He was annoyed with his sons for utilising the courtyard to dump their farm produce. Jhetu had repeatedly objected to this and frequently quarrelled with his sons over the matter. His wife Savitri Sahu always sided with her sons which irritated Jethu, Karba said.
On the night of the murder, another quarrel ensued. As usual, Savitri sided with her sons, saying, “We have lived our lives and anyway, the sons will inherit the property after we are no more’’

CPM activists lodge complaint against MRO

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Tirupati:CPM activists lodged a complaint against Nagalapuram MRO N Raju for allegedly abusing their regional party secretary Ramesh on his caste name.
According to sources, a group of 100 activists belonging to the CPM, Girijana Sangham and Farmers’ Association staged a dharna in front of the MRO’s office on Monday demanding immediate solution to public issues. When the activists did not relent, an irate Raju shouted at Ramesh and asked his staff to get him out of his office. Later, the party activists lodged a complaint in the local police station.