Jun 4, 2013: Raped teen critical after cops, hospital neglect her

Tanushree Roy Chowdhury & Durgesh Nandan Jha, TNN | Jun 4, 2013, 03.59 AM IST

NEW DELHI/GURGAON: Rehabilitation is the least that a rape victim can get from law and order agencies and hospitals. But in a case of apathy, a 13-year-old victim of gang rape and her parents, who are migrant labourers, were shown the door not just by police but also by a hospital in Gurgaon in defiance of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Ordinance, 2013. Now, the victim, who is four months pregnant, faces risk to her life even as Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital and Gurgaon's Civil Hospital are busy passing the buck. 

The 13-year-old victim was abducted by a woman in February and gang-raped by four of her accomplices before being found on March 11. While the city police have managed to arrest just one accused, the remaining four, including the woman, are on the run. A medical report confirmed rape and also found the victim to be 20 days pregnant. Since no one bothered to read out the report to or even inform the parents, who are migrant labourers, about the victim's medical condition, the family claims they had no clue until they saw the deteriorating health of the 13-year-old. 

The matter, according to a city-based NGO-Farishte Group-was not highlighted by the media. "The family approached us only on May 27. After we took the girl to Civil Hospital, senior doctors just made us run around the entire day with the excuse that we did not have documents (medical report). We moved the city court on Tuesday and got an order. When the girl and her parents returned to the hospital on Friday, they had to again face harassment until we went back today (June 3)," said Dr Anju Rawat Negi of Farishte Group. 

According to advocate Kulbhushan Bhardwaj, the duty doctor said the victim was young and had placenta previa (a condition in which the placenta is inserted in the lower uterine segment). She might have to undergo hysterectomy or surgical removal of the uterus in case of excessive bleeding. They offered to refer the case to Safdarjung Hospital. 

However, the advocate added that Dr Sunita Sharma, senior medical officer and also the head of the newly-launched 'One Stop Crisis Centre', "wrote in the referral that the parents wanted to be referred to Safdarjung instead of mentioning the hospital's incompetence". DCP (West) Surender Pal Singh said that they have constituted a special team to arrest the accused. When contacted, Dr Sharma initially denied handling the case. "We do not have the expertise in handling such cases, we do not even operate one in a year," she said. The hospital makes a large number of referrals to private city hospitals, AIIMS and Safdarjung in Delhi. 

Sources at Safdarjung confirmed that the matter had arrived on Monday at 3.30 pm and the patient might undergo a pregnancy termination.

Link: Raped teen critical after cops, hospital neglect her