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Karnataka High Court Quashes Eight Police Notices to Cloudnine Hospital UDR Death Case
The has put a firm brake on a police investigation that crossed the line from an into an . In a filed by Dr Vinuta B and M/s Kids Clinic India Limited – which operates Cloudnine Hospital – Justice M Nagaprasanna quashed as many as eight notices issued by the under . The case arose from the tragic death of 29-year-old Spoorthi Chithriki, who underwent a routine hysteroscopic polypectomy at the hospital on and did not survive an unforeseen intra-operative complication.
A Routine Surgery Turns Fatal
The hospital, complying with its statutory duty, reported the death to the jurisdictional police the same day, leading to the registration of an under . What followed, however, was a barrage of requisitions. Between 20 May and , the investigating officer demanded patient files, CCTV footage, the complete 36-minute unedited video of the surgery, anaesthesia machine logs, and ultimately the physical production of the hospital's operating theatre equipment itself — including the hysteroscopy machine, monitors, and digital data systems.
The petitioners contended they answered every notice and supplied every document requested, including a pen drive containing the unedited operative video, without withholding a frame. Yet the requests kept escalating. Notices under Section 179 of the BNSS were also issued to as many as ten women staff members of the hospital, summoning them to appear personally before the police station.
"This is No to the Investigating Officer"
The court expressed deep discomfort with the manner in which the investigating officer conducted himself once a UDR was opened. Justice Nagaprasanna cautioned that criminal law must not be allowed to invade the medical profession simply because medicine, even at its best, is fallible.
"The object of a UDR is to ascertain the circumstances surrounding the death; it is not intended to become a means of subjecting every person remotely connected with the treatment to needless inconvenience or harassment."
Notably, the court observed that the
— before which the husband of the deceased had already filed a complaint — is the appropriate statutory body to examine issues of professional negligence. The Council has its own powers to summon records and explanations. "The police cannot," the court said,
"by resorting to repeated notices, convert an
into a disciplinary or criminal investigation before the statutory process has even taken its course."
Limited Contours of a UDR Enquiry
Traversing the settled legal landscape, the court relied on a trilogy of precedents: , , and . These authorities make it clear that proceedings under — now Section 194 of the BNSS — are not investigations into an offence. Their scope is limited to ascertaining the . The court quoted the 's finding that an enquiry under this provision 'does not extend to discovering who committed the offence, how the offence was committed, or who should ultimately face prosecution.'
Drawing upon the technical record, the court also observed that the anaesthesia machine operator's manual showed such monitoring logs are usually retained only for 24 hours of a restart. It declined to sit in judgment over the technical specifications of the equipment, leaving that entirely for the 's expert evaluation.
"It's a " – Observations Wrink Led to Quashing
The court pulled no punches in condemning the investigating agency's conduct, describing the begs of the notices as "startling":
"Compliance in the manner demanded would have had the inevitable consequence of paralysing the functioning of the hospital itself, thereby affecting not merely the petitioners found in the hospital countless patients dependent upon the institution for medical care."
All quashing was not, however, an endorsement of neglect. Section 194 BNSS, the Court cautioned,
"although does use the word 'investigation' is not an investigation to find out who are the offenders. It is only to enable the police to come up with the '
'."
To convert this limited exercise into a rolling,
is unlawful.
The Verdict – Quash, With a Fine Line
The High Court allowed the in its entirety, quashing notices dated , , , , and . However, the court clarified that its observations were confined to the UDR enquiry and shall not obstruct, influence, or interfere with any independent action by the . The statutory body remains at operative liberty to proceed with the lodged complaint against the doctor concerned in accordance with the law.
For medical professionals and healthcare institutions, the ruling is a breathing space – a reminder that a patient's unfortunate outcome does not license the state to hold the entire functions of a hospital hostage to an that leads nowhere.
