A writ plea from Dr CS Rex Sargunam, a honorary consultant in pediatrics in the Voluntary Health Services (VHS) hospital in Taramani, to order a probe into the alleged irregularities in the administration of the hospital and take appropriate action was rejected by the Madras High Court last week.
Justice K Chandru, who dismissed a writ petition from Dr Sargunam, also claiming to be the president of Tamil Nadu Health Development Association, observed that petitioner was neither a member of the society nor the trust, which run the hospital. He was not even a member of central committee, which guided the running of the hospital. The central committee comprised several leading personalities including the Accountant General, TN advocate general and the district collector. If there was any irregularity, it would not go out of their attention. Unless the petitioner was a member of the society, he could not compel an action to be initiated on his representation. Similarly, if a public charitable trust was not functioning for the purpose for which it had been established, the only remedy was to correct such a trust by taking a recourse to section 92 of Cr P C by filing a scheme suit, the judge said.
The description that the hospital was a quasi-government also did not stand to reason. Only because it was receiving some aid from the government it would not become a quasi-government. The lands were acquired on behalf of the society and the amounts were fully paid by it. They were having patta in their name. In sofar as the other question that payment of certain amounts towards reimbursement of hospital expenses to the economically poor sections, the trust did not show that it had been intended to be made as a free hospital. On the other hand, the object of the trust was to have a ‘no loss no profit’ running institution. Even for payment of grant towards reimbursement, it was subject to audit by the director of Medical Services, the judge added.
The judge said the other decision taken by the hospital in consultation with the central committee were all matter which came within the internal administration of the society.
Further, each one of the objections raised by the petitioner i.e., outsourcing of pharmacy and lab, discontinuing the MLT course and introduction of consortium has been satisfactorily explained by VHS in its counter, the judge said.
