Rourkela :
A local court in Rourkela has sentenced Pradmanavan Mukhi Karwa (54) to 29 months of rigorous imprisonment for impersonating a medical professional and using forged documents to secure employment at the Rourkela Government Hospital (RGH).
Karwa, a Class XII pass-out from Jharkhand, had been falsely posing as Dr. Ramesh Chandra Jha and was employed at the dialysis centre of RGH through Rahi Care Dialysis, a Chandigarh-based outsourcing firm.
The fraud was uncovered in June 2024 when Karwa applied for a personal loan of ₹16.53 lakh from a private NBFC. During verification, it was discovered that he had submitted genuine certificates belonging to Dr. Jha but with his own photograph attached.
Following a complaint from the finance firm on June 26, 2024, the Raghunathpalli police arrested Karwa under multiple IPC sections for forgery and cheating. Two days later, Rahi Care’s area manager, Mayur Agarwal, also filed a complaint revealing that Karwa had been drawing a salary while working under the false identity.
Public Prosecutor Akshaya Kumar Sahoo said the Chief Judicial Magistrate (First Class) Sarmista Padhi delivered the verdict after examining 14 witnesses. The court also imposed a fine of ₹5,000, with an additional month of imprisonment in case of non-payment. The jail terms under various IPC sections will run concurrently.
This is not Karwa’s first offence. He was previously convicted in April 2022 for a similar impersonation at Nuagaon PHC, where he worked between 2016 and 2019, and was sentenced to two years’ rigorous imprisonment by JMFC, Sundargarh.
