SC directs Kerala hospital to pay Rs 25 lakh to woman for handing over body of her father to another family

New Delhi: The Supreme Court directed a hospital in Kerala to pay Rs 25 lakh as compensation to a woman for handing over the body of her deceased father to another bereaved family who cremated it, in a freak incident of body-mismatch 14 years ago.

Holding M/s Ernakulam Medical Centre and another as liable for deficiency in service, a bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Sandeep Mehta restored the Kerala State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission's order which directed for payment of Rs 25 lakh to the complainant, Dr P R Jayashree and another.

The top court found no justification for a direction by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, which ordered the hospital to pay only Rs 5 lakh to the complainants and deposit Rs 25 lakh to the Consumer Legal Aid account of the state commission.

According to complainants, a patient by the name of Lt Col A P Kanthy, was admitted in the hospital for treatment on December 28, 2009.

After two days, on December 30, 2009 another patient by the name of R Purushothaman, father of the present complainants, was also admitted in the hospital for treatment. He expired on the night of December 30, 2009.

The family members of the deceased asked the hospital to keep the body in the mortuary. The next day, Lt Col Kanthy also expired at the hospital. His body was also kept in the mortuary.

A few hours later, the body of Purushothaman was handed over to the family members of Lt Col Kanthy and they cremated his body.

On January 1, 2010, when family members of late Purushothaman approached the hospital for release of his body, they found that the body in the mortuary was not of Purushothaman.

It was then revealed that the corpse in question had been released to the family members of Lt Col Kanthy who had by then cremated the body.

The complainant filed a plea in the Kerala consumer panel seeking Rs 1 crore with interest as compensation for the deficiency in service on the part of the hospital, which resulted in the direction for payment of Rs 25 lakh.

However, on appeal, the NCDRC modified the state commission's order.

Finding no reason to bifurcate the amount of compensation as directed by the NCDRC, the bench restored the state commission's order but reduced the rate of interest from 12 per cent to 7.5 per cent per annum.