A Division Bench comprising Justices Amit Talukdar and P S Banerjee said that hospital authorities could not shrug off their
responsibility by just filing a police complaint in case a patient goes missing. The medical director of the
hospital has been directed to appear before the Bench on Friday.
This was in response to a habeas corpus petition filed by Sarkar’s wife Shankari against the police and the hospital authorities.
The Kolkata police filed a status report of its investigation to the court informing that they had failed to trace Sarkar but are still continuing with their probe.
Sarkar, a retired railway employee, was admitted to the hospital run by Eastern Railway at Sealdah on September 22, 1999. Two weeks later, his wife Shankari found that Sarkar was missing from his room. She informed the hospital authorities, who failed to trace him. Later, she filed a missing complaint with the Kolkata police.
In the meantime, considering Sarkar as missing, the state government started paying Shankari half pension. In case of her husband's death, Shankari was entitled to a full pension. But as the hospital authorities and Kolkata police could not ascertain whether Sarkar was dead or alive, she continued receiving half pension.