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Doctor Too Busy With Government Event To Attend To Pregnant Rape Survivor In Bareilly

Inhuman.
Representative image.
Jasper James
Representative image.

Where times is of essence in deciding the medical termination of a pregnancy, a shocking case of medical negligence has been reported at a hospital in Bareilly. The Chief Medical Officer (CMO) and his team of doctors in a hospital in Bareilly reportedly kept a 32-week pregnant rape survivor and her father waiting for hours for a check-up, Hindustan Times reported.

The doctor, Vijay Yadav, was allegedly too busy with a government event to celebrate Tehsil Diwas and could not attend to his duties. He did not ask his team to proceed with the medical investigations either. As a result, the duo was asked to come back after a day.

The CMO's behaviour was not only inhuman but also irresponsible, since time is crucial in a case of MTP. There have already been delays in the case, since the girl had lodged an FIR on 7 June 2016, stating that she had been raped. At the time, the 16-year-old was 19 weeks and six days pregnant.

According to an earlier The Times of India, the rape survivor is from Beramnagar village under Shergarh police station. She had gone to work at the house of Asif alias Majhle, who had raped her, then promised to marry her, and continued raping her, until she became pregnant. When she and her family confronted Asif, he and his clan assaulted them, provoking her father to go to police.

Her appeals for MTP in a lower court and a fast-tract court were both rejected, on the grounds that the length of her pregnancy had exceed 12 weeks, which is the stipulated time within which MTP should be carried. However, there are precedents where the Supreme Court and the Delhi High Court have allowed MTP in advance stages of pregnancy for rape survivors, provided the team of doctors carrying it out was sure that the procedure was safe to carry out.

After both the appeals fell through, the girl's father had moved the Allahabad High Court, which disposed of his petition and asked him to file an application to the CMO.

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This article exists as part of the online archive for HuffPost India, which closed in 2020. Some features are no longer enabled. If you have questions or concerns about this article, please contact indiasupport@huffpost.com.