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SC directs Apollo Hospital to reply to report on breach of land lease conditions
The committee report indicted the hospital for making poor patients pay for the medicines and consumables on actual cost basis.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed Indraprastha Apollo Hospital to respond to a report against it, submitted by the Delhi government last week, which found serious violations of land lease conditions in treatment of poor patients over the past five years.
According to the report, a copy of which HT has seen, as against the requirement of providing free treatment to the economically weaker section (EWS) to the extent of 40% in the out-patient department (OPD) and 33% inpatients, stipulated by the lease, the scrutiny of the hospital records by an expert committee revealed that less than 10% of poor patients were getting OPD and inpatient services.
A bench of justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi took the report on record presented by additional solicitor general (ASG) SD Sanjay and posted the matter for hearing after three weeks after Apollo Hospital sought time to file a response.
“The petitioner (Indraprastha Medical Corporation Limited) is at liberty to file a response to the report within three weeks,” the court said. The matter is expected to be heard in the second week of December.
The Supreme Court was hearing an appeal filed by the IMCL, which runs the hospital, challenging a September 22, 2009 order of the Delhi High Court in a public interest litigation filed by All India Lawyers Union, alleging that medical facilities are not being provided to the poor by the Apollo hospital. Delhi HC had directed the hospital to provide beds to poor patients under the lease deed conditions on which it had received the land at a throwaway price of ₹1 per month.
In March, the apex court ordered an inspection by the Centre and the Delhi government. Pursuant to the court’s order, the Delhi government constituted an inspection team of four doctors headed by Dr Anil Aggarwal of GB Pant Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research (GIPMER). The team visited the hospital on three occasions — May 30, June 10 and 16 — and collected data with regard to treatment given to EWS patients.
The Delhi government received the expert committee’s report in July pursuant to which it told the court that the hospital’s lease expired on July 31, 2023, and any further renewal will be taken based on the compliance of the lease condition.
The committee report further indicted the hospital for making poor patients pay for the medicines and consumables on actual cost basis. In some cases, they were charged 20% of the cost of all consumables used in diagnostic service while others were asked to purchase the medicines from outside.
The Apollo group in April 1988 signed a 30-year lease agreement with Delhi government to construct a hospital, and the institution was commissioned on March 16, 1994. The deed allowed the group and its associate entities to construct a multi-specialty hospital on a 15-acre land parcel in Sarita Vihar, but required the hospital to set apart free diagnostic facilities to not less than one-third of the 600-bed multi-specialty hospital. It further stipulated that the hospital shall provide free diagnostic facilities to 40% of the OPD patients.
