On Thursday, a man disguised as a doctor was arrested from Mokalbari tea estate from upper Assams Dibrugarh district. This fake doctor was using the registration number of a Karnataka doctor, identified as Dr Stephen Antony, who has been abroad since 2009. Tea estate sources said that the bogus doctor, known as Simon Nag, was working in Mokalbarias a medical officer since 2018.

This forgery was noticed by Dr. Abhijit Neog of a Guwahati-based hospital. Neogcontacted the real Dr Stephen Antony, who is the original registration number holder and now practicing in Singapore. Antony had graduated from St. Johns Medical College at Bengaluru in 2006. He got his registration from Medical Council of India in 2007.

Neog said that he checked the details of the original registration number holder in Indian Medical Registry and that the permanent address of the doctor was Malleswaram which is in Bengaluru. He was surprised to see the Singapore connection with a Dibrugarh tea garden. He said in the  past 3-4 years, 12 such cases have been detected in Assam. 

A week ago, a few of Neog’s juniors informed him about the doubtful nature of this fake doctor, when the administration ramped up Covid caution in the tea gardens. Due to illiteracy, a large portion of garden workers barely maintained the Covid protocols. More than 2,000 were tested positive in Dibrugarh tea gardens in the 2nd wave and 611 active cases were reported on Wednesday.

This is not the first time when fake doctors are brought to the forefront but in the current situation, when the 2nd wave of Covid had a terrible impact in the upper Assam’s tea belt. The arrest of the fake doctor has brought to light the deeply-rooted holes in the healthcare system. Mostly, doctors who work in remote locations or abroad are being targeted.

Dibrugarh DC Pallav Gopal Jha said that in Assam, there is a post of medical inspector for checking the health infrastructure and manpower in tea gardens. The arrest of the fake doctor has raised questions over the genuineness of the inspection of the healthcare practitioners who were offering healthcare services to the tea workers. This also makes them susceptible to Covid infection.

The accused fake doctor, Simon Nag, had admitted before the media that he has not done MBBS but has passed matric exam. He said that he prescribed medicines just as a doctor and didn’t understand the confusion. He will produce his original documents before the court.

Police sources have confirmed with the school where Nag studied, they stated that he did not pass the matric exam. The police have filed a suo moto case against the fake doctor but they are suspecting an involvement of a bigger racket. 

Source: The Times of India