The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has issued notice to the State Government asking it to show cause as to why an amount of Rs one lakh would not be paid to the family of the newborn baby boy who died just seconds after his birth falling into a water-filled bucket inside the labour room of a Government hospital in Jajpur district.
Adjudicating an application filed by social activist and lawyer Prabir Kumar Das, the NHRC on Thursday observed that the death of the newborn was caused due to head injury which amounts to medical negligence and deserves monetary damage under Section 18 of the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993. The Chief Secretary has been asked to respond to the notice within four weeks.
Das in his application has stated that the baby’s mother Manorama Jena (30) was admitted in the hospital in the afternoon of April 8, 2014 in the advance stage of her pregnancy. She was sent to the labour room under the care of two nurses, who were also attending to five other expectant mothers.
However, around midnight, one of the nurses went to sleep and the remaining one went out of the labour room for some work when Manorama delivered the baby. “The newborn slipped from the bed and fell into the bucket kept by the side of the bed,” Das mentioned in his application.
Reports obtained by the NHRC from the district magistrate and the State Health Secretary also corroborated the fact but had denied any negligence by the hospital staff.But when the postmortem report confirmed that a healthy baby was born but died due to head injuries, the NHRC observed that negligence was caused by the hospital staff.