West Bengal is witnessing massive protests after the gruesome rape and murder of a junior doctor at the state government-run RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata. 

According to reports, the 31-year-old woman was a PG trainee doctor at the institute, and was found brutally assaulted and murdered on Friday, August 9. PTI reported that as per the four-page autopsy report, her neck had been broken after she was raped. She was bleeding from several parts of her body.

A civic volunteer named Sanjay Roy was reportedly taken into custody on August 10 and has been remanded to judicial custody. The brutal rape and murder appear to have occurred on the previous day, between 3 am and 6 am, NDTV said. 

Junior doctors, residents, and paramedic staff from multiple medical colleges across the city — including from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital as well the Kolkata Medical College, Calcutta National Medical College and Hospital, and Nil Ratan Sircar Medical College and Hospital — held protests demanding swift action, according to The Hindu. Similar protests were also held at government-run medical colleges in Burdwan Medical College and Hospital and the Murshidabad Medical College and Hospital among others in the rest of the state. 

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee told media persons that she has ordered for the case to be taken up by a fast-track court, adding that though she was against the practice of capital punishment, the accused would be “hanged if necessary.” 

According to a doctor at RG Kar who spoke to PTI, the victim had had dinner with her colleagues at about 2 am and had then gone to the hospital’s seminar hall to take a break since the institute has no specific facility for on-call doctors to rest. She was found raped and murdered the next morning.