New Delhi, July 12
The Indian Air Force (IAF) faced the
ire of the Delhi High Court on Thursday for confining one of its
non-commissioned officers, a corporal, to a psychiatric ward for over
two months, because he was an alcoholic and suffered from mental
disorders.A Bench of justices S
Muralidhar and Vinod Goel questioned the rationale behind the IAF’s
decision, asking how it determined on a daily basis that the corporal
still “craved for alcohol”.The
court also said the newly-enacted Mental Health Act made it clear that a
person could not be forced to undergo treatment without his consent,
adding that the IAF “cannot ignore the laws of the country”.Terming
the conduct of the IAF “irresponsible”, the Bench wondered how many of
such cases there might be, which were yet to be highlighted.“How
were you determining on a daily basis that his craving for alcohol had
not gone down? What tests were conducted by you? This is completely
irresponsible. We wonder how many such cases are there.“This
is a clear case where a man is saying he has been detained without
consent. Under the new Mental Health Act, you cannot force him to
undergo treatment without his consent. Then how are you pumping him full
of drugs? We do not know who should be proceeded against,” the Bench
said.It added that the IAF needed
to be reminded not to interfere with a person’s liberty as “short of
chaining him up, everything else was done here” and directed that the
corporal be produced in court tomorrow.According
to the IAF, represented by the Centre’s standing counsel, Ripudaman
Singh Bhardwaj, the action against the corporal was taken on a complaint
from his wife that he turned violent after consuming alcohol.Bhardwaj
said the corporal, Kriyad Yogesh Bhankhariya, had alcohol dependency
issues for which he was initially treated in the psychiatric ward of the
Army Base Hospital here and thereafter, in June, he was shifted to the
medical centre at the Tughlakabad Air Force Station.The
court said if the non-commissioned officer (NCO) was an alcoholic, then
the IAF ought to have sought the help of the “Alcoholics Anonymous” on
how to deal with the matter as any psychiatric would confirm that
confinement of a person was advisable only in extreme cases.“It is worrying, the manner in which you have approached the situation,” the Bench told the IAF.The
court was hearing a habeas corpus petition filed by the 30-year-old
corporal’s father, claiming that his son was being illegally confined at
the Army Base Hospital. —PTIFLASH
FLASH
Friday, 13 July 2018
IAF faces HC ire for confining corporal to psychiatric ward for alcohol dependency
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