Sunil Shanker Kunder
Introduction
Sunil Shanker Kunder is a physiotherapist who was registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) under registration number PH133168. On 6 May 2026, a panel of the Health and Care Professions Tribunal Service (HCPTS) — at the end of a substantive hearing that had opened on 29 April — ordered him struck off the register. The panel found misconduct of a sexually motivated nature committed in breach of trust, together with dishonest failures to notify the regulator of a suspension and a dismissal, and concluded that no lesser sanction would be sufficient. It also imposed an interim suspension covering the appeal period, subject to a maximum of 18 months.
Background Information
The published record identifies Kunder as a physiotherapist holding HCPC registration PH133168. The determination window does not name his employer, describe his training or career, or give the date or setting of the alleged conduct, and this page does not guess at any of them. MedicWatch — an independent record service that aggregates publicly published decisions of UK healthcare regulators without editorialising their findings — carries his case with erasure as the most recent published outcome and directs readers to the official HCPC register for his current registration details.
The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation
Regulatory findings, not a criminal case. The findings below come from an HCPTS panel applying the civil standard — the balance of probabilities. They are regulator findings, not criminal convictions, and no criminal proceedings form part of this case.
The allegations concerned the lowering of a service user’s clothing and underwear without clinical justification and without informed consent, alleged to have been sexually motivated or to amount to sexual conduct. Alongside that conduct sat a separate thread of dishonesty: the case included allegations that Kunder had failed to notify the HCPC of a suspension and of a dismissal, and that those failures had been dishonest. The determination window summarises the allegations and the panel’s conclusions without reproducing the underlying evidence in detail; it does not name the service user, identify the setting in which the conduct was said to have occurred, or give its date.
Applying the civil standard, the panel found misconduct of a sexually motivated nature, committed in breach of trust. That phrase carries the substance of the finding: physiotherapy is hands-on treatment in which a service user must be able to rely on every physical contact having a clinical purpose, and what the panel found here was intimate contact — clothing and underwear lowered — that had no such justification and no consent behind it. It further found the dishonest failures of notification proved, so that the case combined an intimate boundary violation with untruthfulness towards the very body that licenses the profession.
On sanction, the panel worked from the conclusion that no lesser outcome would protect the public: striking off, it found, was the only sufficient sanction. It directed that Kunder be struck off the register, and it imposed an interim suspension order to run while the striking-off decision moved through the appeal period, subject to a maximum of 18 months. The combination at the heart of the case — a sexually motivated breach of a service user’s trust and dishonesty towards the regulator itself — is reflected in the panel’s refusal to stop at any lower point on the sanctions ladder.
Public Reaction and Consequences
The published record contains no press coverage of the hearing and no public statements from Kunder or any other party. The concrete consequences are the striking-off direction of 6 May 2026 and the interim suspension that keeps him off the register while any appeal runs its course. The practical effect is the loss of his HCPC registration and, with it, the legal ability to work as a physiotherapist in the UK. Because the determination is the only public account of the case, its findings — a service user’s clothing and underwear lowered without clinical justification or informed consent, sexually motivated misconduct committed in breach of trust, and dishonest failures to tell the regulator of a suspension and a dismissal — stand as the complete published record of why his registration ended.
Current Status
Kunder was struck off the HCPC register by the panel’s decision of 6 May 2026, with an interim suspension in place during the appeal period, subject to a maximum of 18 months. His MedicWatch profile records erasure as his most recent published outcome, notes his registration status as not yet verified, and directs readers to the official HCPC register for his current position, including whether any appeal was pursued or determined. MedicWatch last checked its data on 23 September 2026. The published record shows no restoration application.
Impact on Their Career/Life
Striking off ended Kunder’s registration and his ability to work as a physiotherapist in the UK unless a future restoration application succeeds. The case illustrates how regulators weigh the combination at its core: intimate contact without clinical justification or informed consent, found to be sexually motivated and a breach of trust, compounded by dishonesty towards the regulator itself in failing to disclose a suspension and a dismissal — a combination the panel judged left no lesser sanction sufficient to protect the public. Beyond the determination, the published record contains nothing about his circumstances since the decision.