- Wednesday, May 08, 2024
By: Pramod Thomas
AN employment tribunal has heard that a senior NHS consultant was sacked after he ordered a junior doctor to strip naked in front of him in a hotel room as punishment, reported MailOnline.
Edwin Chandraharan was sacked from St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in south London in February 2020. He had worked there for 15 years as the doctor in charge of a labour ward and previously clinical director.
Though Chandraharan tried to sue the Trust, claiming he was unfairly dismissed and racially discriminated against due to him being British Asian.
Employment Judge Tony Hyams-Parish dismissed the doctor’s claims of unfair dismissal and race discrimination and criticised the doctor for perpetrating ‘serious’ sexual harassment.
According to the MailOnline, Chandraharan demanded the trainee take her clothes off and look into a mirror as punishment. Besides, she encouraged her to let him give her a ‘special massage’, in which she could ‘achieve an orgasm by him only touching her back’.
The tribunal also heard that the senior doctor also sexually harassed another junior doctor while away for a conference by encouraging them to share a hotel room and repeatedly trying to massage her.
Chandraharan denied all allegations and claimed other senior doctors persuaded the women to make up allegations.
The newspaper report said that the first victim was so ‘terrified’ she didn’t want to pursue a formal complaint and in August 2017 Chandraharan was given an informal warning.
However, in 2019, it emerged another female doctor at the Trust, had also been sexually harassed at another conference.
She came forward and reported that he made ‘sexualised comments’ at her and repeatedly encouraged them to share a hotel room, and made ‘creepy advances’.
According to the report, both victims, along with other women at the Trust, formed a WhatsApp group and brought formal allegations against the doctor that led to his dismissal.
