In a significant ruling, the joint charity commissioner of Pune has found the Deenanath Mangeshkar Hospital culpable in the tragic postnatal death of a woman that occurred in March last year. The commissioner's report has recommended initiating criminal proceedings against eleven trustees of the hospital, which is run by a charitable trust.
The Case and the Allegations
The charity commissioner's office has officially filed a case against the trustees in the court of the Judicial Magistrate First Class in Shivajinagar. An official source revealed that the case stems from the conclusion that timely emergency medical treatment was not provided to the patient, Tanisha Bhise. The inquiry found a critical delay in treatment because her family could not immediately pay the deposit amount demanded by the hospital.
The victim, Tanisha Bhise, experienced severe abdominal pain on the morning of March 28 last year. Her family took her to Deenanath Mangeshkar Hospital, where she had been examined previously. However, she was allegedly denied admission. The family subsequently took her to another hospital in their private vehicle, where she later died on March 31.
Hospital's Defense and Official Findings
In an official statement, the hospital claimed it had not received any communication from the charity commissioner's office as of Monday. The hospital's version of events states that the patient was monitored for four hours, after which the family decided to move her to another facility without informing the doctors. "A doctor from the hospital ran after the patient's family to stop them. But her family disregarded the efforts and left the hospital premises," the statement read.
However, these claims were scrutinized during a detailed inquiry. The probe was initiated under the chairmanship of Joint Charity Commissioner Rajani Kshirsagar and included members like Deputy Charity Commissioner Dr. Rajesh Pardeshi. The committee examined hospital records, treatment timelines, and management decisions.
Critically, the Sassoon hospital's medical negligence committee and the deputy director of health services had previously remarked that Deenanath Mangeshkar Hospital should have admitted and stabilised the patient. The charity commissioner's inquiry reinforced this, highlighting a major systemic failure.
Violation of Charitable Trust Mandate
A key aspect of the investigation focused on the hospital's status as a charitable trust. Such institutions are legally mandated to reserve 2% of their billings as an Indigent Patient Fund (IPF), specifically for treating economically backward patients. The inquiry sought to determine why Bhise was turned away despite the trust having a massive IPF corpus of over Rs 35 crore.
The inquiry report was damning. It stated that upon examining the facts, court orders, government decisions, and laws, the hospital's conduct must be considered serious. The report identified violations of Sections 41AA and 66(B) of the Public Trusts Act, 1950. Based on this, permission was granted to file a case, which was subsequently lodged by Inspector Sachin Bakal at the charity commissioner's office.
The incident had sparked massive public protests following Bhise's death on March 31 last year, necessitating police deployment near the hospital to control the situation. The recent legal action brings the case back into the spotlight, raising serious questions about accountability in charitable healthcare institutions.
