In the medico-legal cases registered in the government and private hospitals in the state, the attitude of the police and officials in the name of rules is causing great pain to the victims. If unnatural deaths like accidents, murders and suicides occur, these are registered as medico-legal cases in hospitals.
- Terms that leave heartbreak
- The family members of the deceased should file a complaint
- Constable of that station should come for Panchnama
- Negligence of private hospitals in MLC cases
- Of the four commissionerates, Gandhi and Osmania Hospitals are the destinations for postmortem
- A government that does not focus on decentralization
Hyderabad City Bureau, June 11 (Namaste Telangana): The attitude of police and officials in the name of rules in medico-legal cases registered in government and private hospitals in the state is causing great pain to the victims. If unnatural deaths like accidents, murders and suicides occur, these are registered as medico-legal cases in hospitals. The victims complain that the management of the hospitals and the police in the name of rules are causing serious problems to seize their dead bodies. Those who are grieving the loss of a family member are expressing concern that the systems are leaving more heartbreak in the name of rules.
Last month, a sub-editor working for a TV news channel met with a road accident on the outskirts of the city while riding a motorcycle. Locals rushed him to a nearby private hospital. The family members were informed based on his cell phone. The doctors who operated on the victim with the consent of the family members collected the fee to that extent. After that, the family members moved the victim to Nimes as the hospital bill was getting heavy every day. The victim fought with death for ten days and finally breathed his last. The real problem started when the grieving family started trying to move the body home for the funeral.
As the management of the private hospital registered it as a medico legal case (MLC), Nims security personnel clarified that they will not hand over the dead body until the police come and do the panchnama. As a result, some of the journalist friends of the deceased contacted the police station near the place of the road accident, but the police said that they did not receive any information about the actual incident. Immediately after contacting the private hospital where the victim was first admitted, they said that they did not inform the police. When asked how the MLC case was registered, he said that the night shift staff present on that day must have informed the police. When the night shift staff near the house was contacted, it was learned that they had given the information to another police station.
The fact that they did not record this in the hospital records is a testament to their negligence. They said that if the concerned police station contacts them, the wife or daughter/son of the deceased should come to the police station and file a complaint, then they will send a constable for panchanama. The police said that none of the grieving family members can come, relatives come and complain. As a result, the deceased’s son was sent to the police station 50 km away from Hyderabad. The victim died at 8.30 am. A complaint was registered at the police station at 3.30 pm. It took two hours to write the panchanama document at the police station.
During this process those who went to complain were harassed with questions for an hour and a half. After that, it took another hour to enter the details like name, age and address of the deceased in the ready format in the computer of the station and give a print. There was some delay in getting the inspector to sign the document. It was past 6.30 pm when he reached Nimes along with a constable along with the Panchnama document. The constable said that after the panchnama, the dead body should be taken to Gandhi hospital where the post-mortem will be conducted.
But post mortem will be stopped after 6 pm at Gandhi Hospital. So the dead body was shifted to Gandhi Hospital and had to wait till the next day. Gandhi’s medical staff said that they would not do the post-mortem until the constable came the next day as well. And the constable came at his appointed time and after providing the required details, the postmortem was conducted. The medical staff and the police all said that they worked according to the rules.. but no one paid attention to the hell that the family went through for 48 hours.
If such a situation is faced by the family of a journalist who can influence the police and medical staff, then one can imagine the situation of common people. If there are road accidents, suicides or murder deaths in the state, if it is registered as a medico-legal case then all their families must face this very tough line. In the name of rules, those systems are causing more heartbreak to the family who is grieving the loss of a family member. The way the staff of private hospitals and the police behave as if they do not care is causing more pain to the victims. A medico-legal case coming to a private dispensary should be immediately reported to the concerned police station.
Police should take dying declaration (death statement) depending on the severity of the cases. This death certificate is legally very important for the victim’s family. But a large number of private clinics are not giving information to the police. They are registering as MLC only when they feel that death is around their neck. If the dispensary owner does not inform the police, a death certificate cannot be taken.
All the burden is on the family..
If a person registered as an MLC dies in a dispensary, those systems are making the family suffer hell in the name of rules. If such incidents happen in distant districts, the victims are taken to Hyderabad for treatment. If the victims die in Hyderabad, there is no situation to hand over the body until the police from the area where the incident took place and conduct the Panchnama. If a person from a faraway area like Adilabad dies in Hyderabad, it takes at least 36 hours for the police to come here to file a complaint at the police station there. Until then, the body has to be kept in the mortuary and wait for the police.
Two hospitals!
Only two hospitals in Hyderabad, Gandhi and Osmania, have the facility to conduct post-mortem. Due to this, there is no space in the cold storages of their mortuaries or the dead bodies are kept on the ground. Due to this, there are many incidents of them rotting. Those who have money rent a freezer and keep it. The dead bodies of various cases related to Hyderabad, Cyberabad, Malkajigiri Police Commissionerates and some police stations in Future City should be moved to these two hospitals. Ambulances that bring dead bodies for post-mortem are queued up from 10 to 20 daily at these dispensaries. The postmortem process takes at least half an hour to an hour. Due to shortage of staff, 15 to 20 dead bodies in Gandhi and 10 to 15 dead bodies in Osmania are being postmortemed daily. If a person dies after noon, his body is handed over the next day in the evening. Relatives of the deceased are expressing concern that this is not a vigil.. It is a cruel punishment imposed by the system.
Solution to problems?
- Mainly rules should be made to cancel the license of dispensaries who do not immediately give information related to MLC cases to the police.
- In the states of Karnataka and Goa, the system of 24-hour post-mortem is going strong. Post mortem is also being conducted in private medical colleges in Karnataka. We should study the methods in the respective states and implement them in our country if necessary. If a postmortem system is established in the area hospitals and government medical colleges in the suburbs of Hyderabad, the burden on Gandhi and Osmania will be reduced.
- At present there is a possibility of 24/7 post mortem as per Central Government orders.. It is done with videography in presence of investigating officer in sensational cases in connection with Jeevandhan programme. It is not possible in all cases. Adequate staff should be appointed and steps should be taken to conduct postmortem in three shifts.
- The system should be strengthened so that post-mortem reports are available quickly and appropriate steps should be taken to eradicate corruption.
