KARACHI: The Sindh High Court dismissed the applications of two doctors of a leading private hospital seeking quashment of a case pertaining to the death of a patient during treatment.

Dr Mohammad Usman Shaikh and Dr Ehsan Bari of the Aga Khan Hospital have been facing trial before a sessions court in a private complaint for allegedly committing negligence during a brain surgery of 38-year-old Tahseen Waseem which caused her death in October 2005.

Both the doctors approached the SHC and asked it to quash the proceedings pending before the trial court.

After hearing both sides, a single bench of the SHC headed by Justice Salahuddin Panhwar dismissed the applications.

The court in its order observed that quashment by this court was an extraordinary remedy for the accused while Sections 249-A and 265-K of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) also provided speedy remedy to the accused to agitate the case before the trial court, adding that even if the two forums had got concurrent extensive jurisdiction yet the demand of law would be to approach the lower forum first.

The court further ruled that admittedly extraordinary circumstances were not demonstrated by the applicants which could be taken as a justification for direct approach to this court. It would be appropriate for the applicants to follow normal procedure ie to approach the trial court, which would be competent to decide the fate of the acquittal application under Section 265-K of the CrPC.

In October last year, a sessions court (East) had admitted a private complaint of the deceased’s husband, Waseem Maqsood, against both doctors after recording his statement under Section 200 of the CrPC and holding a preliminary inquiry through a judicial magistrate.

According to the private complaint, the patient was admitted to the hospital in October 2004 and it was diagnosed that she was suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and she had undergone chemotherapy and bone test and was discharged in 2005.

However, the complaint further said that she was admitted again in August 2005 for around two months after doctors said that the patient had relapsed into acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and though there was no emergency or life-threatening condition, the doctors had removed Ommaya reservoir from the head of the patient for brain surgery without conducting any test when her platelet count level was extremely low, due to which she went into coma and died.

The complaint was admitted against both doctors under Sections 319 (unintentional murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code. The trial court has already indicted the accused and now the matter is fixed for evidence.

Murder of Chinese national

The administrative judge of the antiterrorism courts remanded three suspects to prison in a case pertaining to the murder of a Chinese national.

After the end of their last physical remand, an investigating officer of the Counter-Terrorism Department reproduced Saqib Ahmed, Rehan Hashim and Mohammad Aamir Khan before the court.

The administrative judge sent them to prison on judicial remand and directed the IO to complete the investigation and submit the report.

The suspects have been booked for allegedly killing 48-year-old Chen Zhu, managing director of a shipping firm, on Feb 5 near Zamzama Park in Defence Housing Authority.

Initially, the CTD claimed to have arrested two suspects on May 4 at a bus terminal in Hyderabad after they arrived there from Sukkur while Aamir Khan was shown arrested on May 11 and Rustam was an absconder in the case.

The CTD lodged a case under Sections 302 (premeditated murder), 324 (attempted murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.

On May 8, a senior officer of the CTD during a press conference said that Saqib was the son of one of the partners of the same firm, while Hashim was an employee of the company and they had hired an assassin.

Published in Dawn, May 27th, 2018