Surgeon gets two-year jail in 2014 sterilisation deaths case in Chhattisgarh’s Bilaspur

A court in Chhattisgarh’s Bilaspur has sentenced a surgeon to two years of jail term in connection with the deaths of 12 women following sterilisation surgeries conducted by him here in 2014.

The court of First District and Additional Sessions Judge Shailesh Kumar Ketarap on Tuesday convicted surgeon Dr R K Gupta under the charge of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and awarded him two years of imprisonment, Additional Public Prosecutor Devendra Rao Somawar said on Wednesday.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 for each of the 12 deaths, he said.

The court also sentenced Gupta under other charges, awarding six months’ imprisonment with a fine of Rs 500 under one section, and one month’s jail with a fine of Rs 100 under another. All sentences will run concurrently, he said.

The case relates to a sterilisation camp held on November 8, 2014, at a private hospital in Pendari near Sakri village in Takhatpur block of Bilaspur district. A total of 83 women from nearby rural areas were brought to the camp for sterilisation procedures, he said.

According to the prosecution, Dr Gupta, who was then a senior surgeon at the district hospital, conducted all the surgeries within a span of about three hours. Soon after the operations, the women fell ill and were admitted to different hospitals, including district and CIMS (Chhattisgarh Institute of Medical Sciences) hospitals in Bilaspur, where 12 of them died.

The prosecution said the deaths were linked to alleged negligence during surgeries, leading to septicaemia, as well as controversy over contaminated post-operative medication.

Following an investigation, the police had filed a chargesheet against Dr Gupta and five individuals associated with two drug supply firms - Ramesh and Sumit Mahavar of Mahavar Pharma firm, and Rakesh, Rajesh and Manish Khare of Kavita Pharmaceuticals. However, the court acquitted all five accused linked to the pharmaceutical firms due to lack of evidence, he said.

Since the sentence awarded to Gupta is less than three years, the court granted him bail as per legal provisions, the prosecutor added.