Government undertakings providing free medical treatment to employees without consideration are not liable for negligence in the absence of evidence.

Mr. D.D. Bahuguna, Sr. Member—This is an appeal against the judgment and order dated 28.8.12001 passed by District Consumer Forum, Kanpur Dehat in Complaint Case No. 952 of 1999.

2. The brief facts of the case are that the husband of the complainant, Smt. Vinod Kumari Srivastava, is a permanent employee of the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, Kanpur and is entitled to free medical treatment through HAL Dispensary there. The husband of the complainant Sri Bajrang Bahadur Srivastava, all of a sudden fell sick and was taken to the HAL Hospital at 3.30 a.m.on 10.7.1994. No doctor was available in the dispensary. The Medical Superintendent of the opposite party reached the dispensary two hours late and in the meantime the condition of the complainant’s husband deteriorated. He was later on referred to the Institute of Cardiology at Kanpur by the HAL Hospital authorities. It has been alleged that in case the complainant’s husband had been attended to promptly then he would not have suffered heart attack for which the complainant had to spend a lot of money in the treatment. Therefore, the doctors in the HAL Hospital are responsible and are liable for negligence as a result of which her husband had become a heart patient. A claim was, therefore, filed before the District Forum for recovery of Rs. 2,00,000/- from the opposite party.

3. The opposite party, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd., Kanpur filed a joint statement before the District Forum alleging that the Forum has no jurisdiction to try the complaint case because no consideration was charged from the employee of the HAL and the facility of treatment was free of charge. The complainant’s husband has given first aid at the dispensary and later on, on the advice of the Medical Superintendent, he was referred to the Medical College, Kanpur. Therefore, there has been no deficiency on the part of the opposite party.

4. The parties led evidence before the learned District Forum, who after considering the case of the parties, dismissed the complaint.

5. Aggrieved of this order of the District Consumer Forum, the complainant has come in this appeal.

6. The appeal was filed on 29.9.2001 and the date fixed for admission is 9.7.2002, i.e. today. The signature of Sri R.K. Srivastava, Advocate for the appellant appears in the memo of appeal in acknowledgement of the date fixed for today. Despite this he is not present.

7. We have heard the learned Counsel for the respondent and have perused the memo of appeal along with the records of the appeal file. In the complaint itself the complainant has alleged that the HAL Hospital provides medical treatment free of cost. In the written statement the case of the opposite party is that the HAL Hospital carries out treatment of the personnel of the HAL without taking any consideration and the treatment is done without taking any charge from the patients. As soon as the patient was brought to the hospital he was administered preliminary treatment and later on was shifted to Medical College, Kanpur. There is no paper on record which will go to show that any consideration was charged by the opposite party in the treatment of the complainant’s husband. A perusal of the judgment and order also goes to show that no such evidence was filed before the District Forum which will go to show that any consideration was charged from the complainant’s husband. It is a known fact that HAL is a Government of India undertaking and the dispensary in the premises of the HAL is not meant for treating major illnesses for which reference was made to the Medical College, Kanpur. In the circumstances the District Consumer Forum was perfectly within its right to dismiss the complaint. Thus the appeal is liable to be dismissed.

ORDER

The appeal is dismissed and the judgment and order of the learned District Forum are confirmed and the complaint is dismissed. There will be no order as to the costs.

Appeal dismissed.

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