City mourns great Rutherford Medical Centre GP Dr Sambhu Mukherjee

Dr Mukherjee founded Rutherford Medical Centre in 1972 and was a GP for more than 40 years before retiring in 2014.

He and his wife Bani, who died in October 2022, were married for 61 years.

They were proud parents of two boys Suva and Suvendu (Monti), and loving grandparents to Sudeep.

Dr Mukherjee, born February 1, 1932, was raised in a village near Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), India, and attended Kolkata Medical College where he trained as a GP and respiratory physician.

He and Dr Sanjoy Chatterjee, who he met at medical school, came to Maitland and founded their practice in Telarah before moving to its current location at Rutherford.

Dr Mukherjee is being remembered as a great doctor who would go out of his way to help his patients, working day and night and on public holidays as well as offering home visits.

His son Suvendu (Monti) Mukherjee said he can remember going grocery shopping with Dr Mukherjee as a boy, and his father introducing him to people who he had helped deliver as newborns while he was a junior doctor at Maitland Hospital.

"He was very, very caring but quite strict," Mr Mukherjee said.

"But an incredibly hard worker and incredibly caring."

Mr Mukherjee said his father thoroughly enjoyed his career, and appreciated his loyal patients who he enjoyed chatting to as they both got older.

"He enjoyed caring for the elderly, he really enjoyed that challenge and the continuity and loyalty of his patients," he said.

Many of Dr Mukherjee's patients were generational; he often treated grandparents, parents and children of the same family.

Mr Mukherjee said his father spent his nine years of retirement in the garden, which was his passion.

When Dr and Mrs Mukherjee were younger they loved to travel.

"They've done the Rockies, Alaska, America and they've travelled through Europe a couple of times," Mr Mukherjee said.

"They used to love travel."

A Facebook post by Rutherford Medical Centre announcing Dr Mukherjee's death said "he will forever be remembered as a great friend, brilliant family doctor, a loving and caring man who thought more for others than for himself, for his stubbornness, his determination and his will".

"His memory will live on in his family, his loved ones, his colleagues, his friends, in our practice and with his patients, forever," it said.

Dr Mukherjee's funeral is on Saturday, May 20 at Newcastle Memorial Park, Beresfield at 11am. It will be public and all are welcome.

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