Doctors who died on duty during COVID-19 entitled to insurance under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana: Supreme Court

New Delhi: The Supreme Court held on Thursday that the families of the doctors who died while doing their duties during the COVID-19 pandemic are entitled to an insurance coverage of Rs 50 lakh under the "Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana".

A bench of Justices P S Narasimha and R Mahadevan set aside a Bombay High Court judgment that had held that private doctors were not entitled to the coverage under the government's insurance scheme.

"There is a requisition of the services of doctors and this is evident from the conjoint reading of the provisions of the Act, the Maharashtra Prevention and Containment of COVID-19 Regulations 2020, the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation Order dated March 31, 2020, the PMGKY-Package Scheme, the explanatory communication to the PMGKY policy and the FAQs released," the bench said.

It said the invocation of laws and regulations was intended to leave no stone unturned in requisitioning the doctors and the insurance scheme was equally intended to assure doctors and health professionals in the frontline that the country is with them.

The court said individual claims for insurance made under the PMGKY-Package will be considered and decided in accordance with the law and on the basis of evidence.

"The onus to prove that a deceased lost his life while performing a COVID-19-related duty is on the claimant and the same needs to be established on the basis of credible evidence," it added.

The top court was hearing a plea moved by Pradeep Arora and others against a March 9, 2021, order of the Bombay High Court that held that private hospital staffers were not entitled to receive benefits under the insurance scheme unless their services were requisitioned by the state or the central government.

A plea was filed in the high court by Kiran Bhaskar Surgade, who lost her husband -- who ran a private clinic in Maharashtra's Thane -- to COVID-19 in 2020.

The insurance company rejected her claim under the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Package (PMGKP) on the ground that her husband's clinic was not recognised as a COVID-19 hospital.

The PMGKP was announced in March 2020 and its coverage has since been extended.

It was launched to provide a safety net to health workers to ensure that in case of any adversity due to COVID-19, their families are taken care of.

An insurance cover of Rs 50 lakh is provided to the health workers under the PMGKP, which has become a safety net for the dependents of the Covid warriors who lost their lives to the infection.