HC orders state govt to compensate advocate

Odisha Sun Times Bureau

Cuttack, Apr 27:

The High Court on Friday directed the Odisha government to pay a compensation of Rs 50,000 each to an advocate and his nephew who were subjected to mental and physical torture in 2000 by a group of medicos at the SCB Medical College and Hospital here.

A single-judge bench of Justice BK Patel, while disposing of a petition in the matter, ordered the state government to pay the compensation amount to the petitioners within eight weeks from the day the judgment was pronounced.

The High Court ‘s order was based on the recommendations made by Justice P K Mishra Commission of Enquiry in 2002.

It may be noted that the Commission had in its observations said that both advocate Manoj Kumar Mohanty and his nephew Biswa Bijay Mohanty were brutally tortured in a hostel of the medical college throughout the intervening night of July 16-17, 2000.

The Commission’s report recommending the state government to pay damage of Rs 50,000 each to uncle-nephew duo was also tabled in the state Assembly in July 2002.

The victims approached the High Court through a writ petition as the government failed to act on the recommendations of the Commission even after 10 years.

It was due to alleged negligence in treatment in the hospital that on July 16, 2000 advocate Manoj Kumar Mohanty’s father died.

Advocate Mohanty had alleged that while his father was writhing in pain  in his cabin after a surgery, the resident doctors, instead of attending to his father, were watching pornographic movies in their rest room.

When advocate Mohanty brought the matter to the notice of the hospital authorities, the irate medicos forcibly dragged Mohanty and his nephew to a nearby hostel and beat them up mercilessly.

Mohanty and his nephew had alleged that they were subjected to inhuman torture by being stubbed with lighted cigarette butts and piercing of their bodies with injection needles.