Centre to pay Rs 10 lakh for dead jawan’s stolen kidney

Sapna Tyagi’s world came crashing down eight years ago when she was informed about her husband’s death. Ajai Kumar, an armyman, was posted with his unit at Baramulla. He died immediately after his transfer to Meerut, reports HT Correspondent.

Sapna Tyagi’s world came crashing down eight years ago when she was informed about her husband’s death.

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Ajai Kumar, an armyman, was posted with his unit at Baramulla. He died immediately after his transfer to Meerut.

Tyagi wasn’t informed of the cause of her husband’s death. She didn’t know if Kumar, who was with the Engineer Regiment, was killed in a gunbattle or had committed suicide; the army kept giving her conflicting versions.
But the worst was yet to come.

As she tried to get to the root of her husband’s death, Tyagi discovered that his body was missing a kidney. That fact came to light when a second post-mortem was conducted on her plea.

On Monday, the Delhi High Court directed the Centre to pay Rs 10 lakh compensation to Tyagi. After going through both post-mortem reports, the court found that in the first report, the doctor had mentioned that only a portion of the left kidney was taken for chemical examination, while the second report said the left kidney was missing.

Sanjay Katyal, representing the Centre and army, argued that the kidney was removed for viscera test and, therefore, was found missing when the second post-mortem was conducted. However, the argument failed to convince the judge.