Statue of doctor who gave India its 1st test tube baby installed at NRS Hospital

kolkata: A bronze statue of Dr Subhas Mukhopadhyay, father of test tube baby in India, was installed at Nilratan Sarkar Medical College and Hospital on Friday.

Dr Mukhopadhyay, who was a professor of Physiology at NRS medical College and Hospital, committed suicide on June 19, 1981 after the Left Front government and Centre refused to share his achievement with the international scientific community. Dr Mukhopadhyay wrote in detail in his suicide note how he had been harassed by the then state government and the bureaucrats. Famous film director Tapan Sinha had made a film 'Ek Doctor Ki Maut' on the life and works of Dr Mukhopadhyay.

The NRS Boys Hostel was renamed after Dr Mukhopadhyay by the state Health department. He was once the superintendent of the hostel. A plaque was installed on the pathway that leads to the doctors' quarters where he used to stay. A three-day national conference of the Academy of Clinical Embryologists started in Kolkata on Friday to commemorate the 90th birth anniversary of Dr Mukhopadhyay. The doctors demanded that October 3 the day, when the first Indian test tube baby Kanupriya Agarwal whom Dr Mukhopadhyay named Durga was born, should be observed as national fertility day. They also demanded that a medical college be named after him and a road to be renamed after Dr Mukhopadhyay.

Dr Mukhopadhyay created the world's second and India's first child using in-vitro fertilisation in 1978. After coming to power in 2011, Mamata Banerjee took steps to show belated respect to the great scientist.