The PIL, which comes after the busting of an international kidney transplant racket run by Dr Amit Kumar — who was arrested from a forest resort in Nepal and sent to CBI custody — highlights the need for a review of the Human Organ Transplant Act, 1994.
The petition, moved jointly by social activist Rahul Verma and advocate Rakesh Prabhakar, impleaded the Centre, state government and other entities, including the Medical Council of India, Health Ministry and the Law Ministry.
It also drew the court’s attention to environmental hazards, which precipitate or result in kidney failure, like arsenic and fluoride poisoning.
The petition also sought the High Court’s direction to the government to come clean on the required safety standards for manufacturing and processing aerated drinks and purified drinking water.
The petitioners asked the High Court to direct the Health Ministry “to show how it monitors the usage of food additives in packed food items or usage of pesticides on agricultural products for their residual harmful effects, during consumption of food.”
Besides, it also asked the government to initiate comprehensive cadaver programme for donation of human organs, modeled on the eye donation campaign.
“All district hospitals and medical colleges should create, within an approved time frame, the infrastructure and protocols needed both for counseling next-of-kin of brain dead patients and to retrieve donated organs,” the PIL stated.