A Kolkata court on Monday criticised the authorities at the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital and the police for attempting to cover up the murder of a junior doctor as a suicide, Live Law reported.

The Sealdah Civil and Criminal Court handed a life sentence to Sanjay Roy, a former civic police volunteer, who was convicted for the rape and murder of the 31-year-old medic at the state-run hospital in August.

In its 172-page judgement convicting Roy, the court criticised the police for lapses in investigation and the hospital authorities for attempting to cover up the incident.

“There is no doubt to consider that from the end of any authority, efforts were made to show the death as a suicidal one so that the hospital authority would not face any consequences,” the court said.

“From the case record it appears that the said ‘illegal dream’ of the authority was not fulfilled as the junior doctors raised protest and submitted one memorandum to the principal and at that time, police force started their action but it caused sufficient delay and probably it was the reason for which the parents of the victim were not allowed to see their daughter,” the judgement added.

The court also questioned why the first information report was filed after 11.30 pm on August 9, despite the incident being reported in the morning that day, the Hindustan Times reported.

The trainee doctor was found dead on the hospital’s premises. 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.

Roy was arrested by the Kolkata Police on August 10, the day after the body of the doctor was discovered in the hospital’s seminar room.

Three days later, the Calcutta High Court ordered the Central Bureau of Investigation to probe the matter.

The court held a daily trial after the chargesheet was filed in the matter on October 7. Roy had claimed that he was innocent.

After protests erupted in August seeking justice for the doctor, 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 protesters, 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 looking into 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.