Jalandhar, July 9
The Punjab and Haryana High Court has reprimanded the Punjab Police for filing a cancellation report and giving a clean chit to the accused in the case of glaring discrepancy reported in the functioning of a blood bank being run at Gulab Devi Hospital in Jalandhar.
The next date of hearing has been scheduled for August 3. The directions have been issued in a court order dated July 7 by a Bench comprising Chief Justice Ravi Shankar Jha and Justice Arun Palli.
Expressing displeasure at handling of the case by the police, the Bench stated: “The police authorities are persisting in filing a cancellation report, giving a clean chit to the accused.”
The court has directed the Joint Commissioner of the Department of Food and Drugs Administration, and DGP to submit their reports in the matter, along with the affidavits of the Principal Secretary of the Health and Family Welfare Department, and the Principal Secretary of the Home Department.
The court has also sought reports on other blood banks being run by the same organisation in Punjab and Haryana by the next date of hearing.
The order pertains to serious irregularities found during an inspection at the blood bank attached to Gulab Devi Hospital, Jalandhar, on August 4, 2018, following which the licence of the bank was cancelled.
Citing the status report filed by the State of Punjab on July 1 this year, the court observed that following the FIR, a cancellation report was filed by the police in the same case on July 4 this year in the court of Judicial Magistrate of First Class, Jalandhar.
Desipte the Judicial Magistrate’s refusal to accept the same and returning it to the SHO for further investigation, the police authorities again proposed to send a cancellation report, affirming their previous stance.
The Bench held: “We regrettably record our serious displeasure in the manner in which the authorities of the state have taken up this matter. We are constrained to say that irregularly collected blood by the blood banks have been administered to lakhs of people during the pandemic, disastrous results of which are not known to anybody and perhaps may never come to light.”
Blood bank discrepancy: Punjab and Haryana High Court raps police for clean chit to accused
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