NCP MLA Recommends Doctor Arrested in Pune Porsche Case
NCP MLA Sunil Tingre’s recommendation for one of the arrested doctors in the Pune Porsche case has come to light this week. Tingre allegedly wrote a letter to Maharashtra Medical Education Minister Hasan Mushrif in 2023 recommending that Dr Ajay Taware be given additional charge as medical superintendent.
Dr Ajay Taware, head of the state-run hospital’s forensic medicine department, and staff member Ghatkamble were arrested for allegedly swapping blood samples taken after the accident on May 19. They allegedly replaced the sample with the samples of another person’s blood which had no traces of alcohol.
The Pune police are now probing the role of Sunil Tingre, who allegedly used his clout to alter the investigation in the Porsche accident case. In the letter dated December 26, 2023, MLA Tingre said he knew Dr Taware who had worked as superintendent and discharged his duties well during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A handwritten note from Mushrif instructing the dean of the Sassoon hospital to grant Dr Taware the extra charge was also included in the letter. The police have come across call records and WhatsApp messages to the doctors and are investigating whether the lawmaker had contacted the Sassoon doctors during the investigation.
Questions were also raised after it was reported that Tingre had visited the Yerawada police station after the May 19 accident. He later told the media that the minor’s father was his ex-employer and because he was a resident of the area he represented, he had visited the police station to check if the probe was being properly conducted.
Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole alleged that the Sassoon hospital was a “five-star hotel for criminals.” He demanded the resignation of the state’s Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and called for a CBI investigation into the car crash case.
The Pune District Court remanded the father and the grandfather of the 17-year-old in police custody till May 31 in the case of ‘kidnapping’ of the family driver. The police said earlier that the two men offered money and threatened the driver to take the blame for the accident.
