In a significant ruling, the Orissa High Court on Thursday directed the State Government to pay a sum of Rs 10 lakh as compensation within six weeks to the family members of one Martha Sabar of Gajapati district who died due to medical negligence just hours after delivering a dead child in March 2015.
A Division Bench headed by Chief Justice S Muralidhar also asked the Government to immediately issue show-cause notices to all those whose conduct has been adversely commented by an Enquiry Committee which was constituted by the Odisha State Commission for Women (OSCW) and take action against the errant doctors, health workers and staffs of the district.
“There has been acute failure of the entire team of doctors at each level of the healthcare system in Odisha to provide timely and adequate care and treatment to the deceased as pointed out by the Enquiry Committee,” the Bench said, observing that the incident shocks the judicial conscience as the poor tribal woman had been carrying a dead foetus for about a week prior to her death with not a single healthcare worker coming to her rescue.
“This has been a clear violation of the fundamental right to health of the deceased which constitutes an integral part of the right to life guaranteed in Article 21 of the Constitution,” the court said with deep concern and ordered for the OSCW enquiry while also adjudicating 27 other writ petitions filed in the court of similar nature.
“The increasing maternal deaths in Odisha point to a systematic failure of the healthcare system which appears to have failed the poorest and weakest at a time when they need it the most,” the Division Bench, also comprising Justice MS Raman, said in its 23-page judgment.