3 BHEL doctors, who declared alive man dead, booked

The Ranipur police in Haridwar on Sunday registered a case against three doctors of a state-run hospital for alleged negligence leading to the death of an employee of the Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL).

The case was registered at the Ranipur police station after the wife of the BHEL employee Krishna Kumar, 44, filed a complaint, saying that her husband died due to negligence of the three doctors of the public sector unit, police said.

The three doctors at the BHEL-run hospital against whom the case has been registered include Balwant Singh Kuswaha, Parmanand Joshi and Sarabjeet Singh, police said.

On January 12, Kumar, who collapsed following chest pain, was rushed to the BHEL hospital, where doctors him dead at 11.30pm. Soon after, the ‘body’ was shifted to the mortuary.

The next day, on January 13, doctors carried out the post-mortem examination at 2pm. As per the report, the death occurred about six hours before the post-mortem examination, putting its time at around 8am — a gap of more than eight hours after Kumar was declared dead.

The victim’s brother, Yogendra Kumar, in a police complaint, accused the doctors of negligence leading to Kumar’s death.

In the complaint, he said the family members and others present during the opening of the mortuary had found that Kumar’s body was reportedly wet due to pee. They also noticed vomit fluid near Kumar’s mouth.

Kumar was declared dead by a panel of doctors the same night and his body was kept at the hospital mortuary overnight and an autopsy was conducted the next day at 2pm.

Later, it came to light from the postmortem report, which indicated that the death occurred just six hours before the postmortem was carried out, which meant that Kumar was alive the whole night at the mortuary, the autopsy report has revealed.

The then chief medical officer Ashok Gairola ordered a probe after Haridwar’s senior superintendent of police Krishan Kumar VK wrote to him citing details of the post-mortem report.

A panel of two senior doctors will verify the postmortem report and submit their findings within a week.

The panel in its findings held the doctors to be liable for gross negligence in the case and confirmed the autopsy report.

The BHEL hospital authorities, too conducted an internal enquiry, seeking explanation from the doctors. The doctors were found guilty of negligence, leading to death of the employee.

National Human Rights Commission, too sent a notice to the BHEL hospital management, seeking an explanation and ensuring that proper aid was provided to the victim’s family members.

Ranipur police station in-charge Aishwarya Pal said a case has been registered on complaint of deceased BHEL employee’s wife under Section 304 (attempt to murder) of the Indian Penal Code.

“Police have started an investigation into the case,” she told Hindustan Times.

Yogendra Kumar, the brother of deceased BHEL employee, said his brother could have been saved had the doctors not deprived him of medical treatment instead of declaring him dead without proper examination.

“The doctors killed my brother, first by depriving him medical treatment and then by shifting him to a mortuary where the temperature was near freezing point,” Yogendra Kumar said.

“For the whole night, an alive but unconscious Krishan was kept in the frozen mortuary, which was the reason he died, after registration of a case against the doctors, we now hope to get justice, though we know our brother will not return again.”