CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Tuesday censured the Chennai city police and asked it to file a detailed report on the 74-year-old missing COVID-19 patient within a day's time.
The elderly man has been missing for over a month since he was picked up by the Chennai corporation staff from his house for the treatment.
The corporation staff had misled the family saying that the elderly man was safe in the Kilpauk Medical College Hospital and only later it was found that the man had gone missing.
Hearing a habeas corpus petition, a two-member bench of the HC lamented over the delay in transfer of the case from one police station in the city to another causing delay in the investigations.
"It was unfortunate that the state is delaying the filing of the status report in a court-ordered matter," observed a division bench of R Kirubakaran and VM Velumani. The bench said the court had already given a week for the government to file the report.
According to the petition filed by the son of the missing patient A Thulasidass, Adikesavan of Alandur had tested positive for COVID-19 on June 11 and was taken by a corporation sanitary inspector to the Ekkattuthangal screening centre. He was later shifted to Kilpauk Medical College Government Hospital.
However, after a few days, his son found out that his father was never hospitalised in KMCH. On investigation, it was found that on June 15 he was taken to the Rajiv Gandhi Government Hospital, but was never given any treatment.
The additional public prosecutor M Prabhavathi submitted that the investigation report is to be transferred to the Flower Bazaar police station from the Kilpauk Police Station. To which the court observed, "Unfortunately, there is a delay by more than a week in transferring the case from one police station to another and the court is unable to understand the cause for the delay."
The manner in which the administration deals a court-ordered matter cannot be accepted, it added
The counsel for the petitioner Poongkhulali argued that a blame game has ensued between the police officials and the Chennai corporation staff. "The police are saying that it was the corporation staff who has to be held responsible and not the police officials," the petitioner's counsel submitted to the division bench.