A Kolkata court on Saturday held civic police volunteer Sanjay Roy guilty of raping and murdering a junior doctor at the city’s RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in August, reported Live Law.

Roy’s sentence will be pronounced on Monday.

Civic volunteers are contractual workers engaged by the police for duties that may not require police personnel, like traffic management.

The 31-year-old trainee doctor was found dead on the state-run hospital’s premises on August 9. The incident sparked protests across the country.

For several weeks, the West Bengal Junior Doctors’ Front led protests demanding the resignation of senior officials and an end to the “threat culture” in West Bengal’s medical centres.

On Saturday, Judge Anirban Das of the Additional District and Sessions Court in Sealdah said that the maximum possible sentence for Roy would be the death penalty. The minimum sentence would be life imprisonment.

At the hearing, Roy told the court that he was not involved in the incident and claimed that he was innocent, Live Law reported.

The court had held a daily trial after a chargesheet was filed in the matter on October 7.

Roy was arrested by the Kolkata Police a few days after the incident, but the Calcutta High Court had ordered the Central Bureau of Investigation to probe the matter.

The Supreme Court took suo motu cognisance of the case amid public outrage.

After the incident, the Kolkata Police imposed prohibitory orders barring the assembly of a crowd outside the medical institute for several days. On August 15, a mob of 5,000 to 7,000 persons broke into and vandalised the hospital premises. The protestors, including doctors, were attacked by the mob.

Healthcare services across West Bengal were impacted for several weeks as protesting doctors at state-run hospitals held a strike against the incident.

The Central Bureau of Investigation is separately probing alleged tampering of evidence in the case, and alleged corruption at the medical facility. The persons accused in the case include the hospital’s former principal Sandip Ghosh and an ex-officer-in-charge of the Tala police station, among others.

Trinamool Congress leader Sougata Roy welcomed the verdict. “The ruling must be followed by the harshest punishment possible for Roy,” the MP from Dum Dum told The Indian Express.

“This will not only serve as a warning to others who think they can get away with lawlessness but also restore people’s faith in the system,” he added. “We need to ensure that such actions are met with the strongest deterrent.”

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