How the current laws can shield doctors from malicious prosecution"

 How the current laws can shield doctors from malicious prosecution" 

Issues with the malicious prosecution

It causes an assault on reputation. For example, a woman doctor in Dausa district of Rajasthan committed suicide when FIR was registered against her for alleged misconduct and negligence.

Even the government personnel get certain immunities while performing “sovereign” functions. For example, the police machinery gets immunity from tortuous liability while performing this sovereign function like investigating a case, maintaining law and order (and arrest and detention), etc.

What should be done?

There should be a collective fight against the tyranny of malicious prosecution and tutored reporting.

The Law Commission of India, in “Wrongful Prosecution (Miscarriage of Justice): Legal Remedies” report 2018 suggested a draft law. However, it was mostly compensatory, which talks about criminal remedies, but barely touches on preventive aspects. Therefore, efforts should be made to institute preventive and substantive fear through various measures as given below.

The IPC Sections 182  ( BNS 217. False information, with intent to cause public servant to use his lawful power to injury of another person ) and and 211(Section 248 BNS)(for both public servant and private complainant) and section 166-A ( Section BNS 199. Public servant disobeying direction under law) deals with acts of omission and commission to institute false charges. The Law Commission also looks at their role as possible remedies.

The Section 248 BNS( 211 of the IPC) can be an effective tool to penalise false charges made with intent to injure a person (including their reputation). The section is stringent with imprisonment up to seven years.

Disciplinary action should also be taken by professional bodies like the bar associations and prosecution bodies, in case of tutoring and abetment of false charges.

Lessons should be learnt from the recent verdict of the trial courts in Jhunjhunu, Rajasthan, where around 52 convictions have been made for malicious prosecution in a special drive recently.

The medical bodies can create a corpus to fund legal representation in every case of vandalism, violence and disruption of healthcare functions and premises to ensure quick and certain convictions.