New Delhi, The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought the Delhi government’s stand on a plea challenging the decision of the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences (ILBS) to give free treatment to only 10 per cent beds in the in-patient department and 25 per cent cases in the out-patient department for economically weaker sections (EWS).
A bench of Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia issued notice to the Delhi government and ILBS on the public interest litigation (PIL) by NGO Social Justice.
Advocate Satyakam, appearing for the petitioner, submitted that IBLS, a premier government-funded public healthcare institution specialising in serious liver diseases such as hepatitis, cirrhosis and liver cancer, cannot be permitted to adopt a policy which effectively converts it into a “predominantly paid medical institution.”
He submitted that the decision was arbitrary, unreasonable and violative of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution as it discriminated between affluent and indigent patients by denying the latter’s constitutional right to access affordable and timely healthcare.
The court listed the matter for hearing on April 22 and asked the respondents to file their response.
In the petition filed through lawyer Ashok Agarwal and Kumar Utkarsh, the NGO asserted that even private hospitals allotted land by the government at concessional rates are required to provide free treatment to EWS patients to the extent of 10 per cent in-patient department (IPD) and 25 per cent out-patient department (OPD), and a fully government-owned hospital providing the same benefit was “wholly incongruous”.
The PIL emphasised that the Supreme Court has mandated state-run hospitals to ensure equitable access to healthcare without “commercial barriers”, and the “exclusionary and revenue-oriented policy” of ILBS has effectively converted it into a paid hospital, defeating the very purpose of its establishment.
Stressing that ensuring access to health facilities for vulnerable and marginalised was the government’s “core obligation”, the PIL sought a direction to quash ILBS policy and ask it to provide 100 per cent beds and medical services for free treatment to the general public.
Alternatively, directions should be issued to ILBS to enhance the EWS/free category quota to at least 50 per cent, it added. PTI
