After spending eight months in jail, Dr Kafeel Khan has been finally granted bail. He shot to prominence for the role he played in trying to save dying children in Uttar Pradesh’s BRD Medical College hospital last year where more than 70 children died due to lack of oxygen. Dr Khan was regarded as the prime accused and arrested shortly after. In a message to The Citizen, Adil Khan, Dr Kafeel Khan’s brother said, “Bail ho gayi, Allah shukar…”
Lawyer Nazrul Islam Jafri who is representing Dr Khan said that he would now make a case for questioning the proceeding altogether.
Dr Khan had penned a letter, dated April 18, saying that he has been wrongly framed in the case and has been locked in jail for eight months without bail over no fault of his. This letter was released by his wife Dr Shabistan Khan in a press conference.
In the letter he wrote, “But my life turned upside down when CM Yogiji Maharaj arrived next morning on 13 August 2017. He asked – ‘so you are Dr Kafeel? You arranged cylinders?’ I was like – ‘yes sir’. He got angry – ‘so you think by arranging cylinders, you became a hero, I will see it’.”
Dr Shabistan had also alleged that the Dr Kafeel Khan and other doctors serving jail term have been denied proper medical care and that she fears for her husband’s life who suffered a heart stroke in jail.
She said, “My husband’s health is deteriorating. Doctors have said that the case must be referred to Lucknow, but it the jail administration is not executing the orders. I fear for my husband’s life.”
Background
More than 70 children lost their lives in a tragic incident of medical mismanagement in Baba Raghav Das (BRD) Medical College Hospital in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh (UP) in August last year.
Most deaths were reported from the neonatal and encephalitis wards.
The deaths were reportedly caused due to non-payment of outstanding accumulated dues worth Rs 68 lakh that the hospital owed to Pushpa Sales, the sole supplier of liquid oxygen to the hospital. Dues remained even after the supplier intimated the hospital and the hospital, in turn, intimated the government several times of the shortage.
On the night of August 10, it was Dr Khan who decided to take control of the situation by driving to private homes to borrow oxygen cylinders, reported Economic Times. He even paid Rs 10,000 to an oxygen supplier out of his own pocket, reported CNN-News18.
Khan was removed from his position on August 13 on charges of “dereliction of duty” and for “carrying out private practice”.
