On Wednesday, the Centre in Delhi informed the Supreme Court that it will soon revise the guidelines and non-compliance of the instructions should be an offence under the Disaster Management Act and the Indian Penal Code. The Centre is taking a strong stand against states and hospitals as they are not paying regular salaries to doctors and healthcare workers.

A bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan agreed with Centre’s stand and said that any violation by states shall be treated as an offence under the Disaster Management Act and Section 188 of IPC (disobedience duly promulgated by a public servant).

The court has given one month’s time to the Centre for agreement and after that the hearing will be done. On 12th June, the upper court had said that the country cannot afford to have “disappointed soldiers” in the battle against the coronavirus pandemic.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta informed the upper court that the directive will be issued on Thursday. The court has also asked the chief secretaries of all states and UTs to obey the order. The court was hearing a plea that was filed by Dr Arushi Jain, who had challenged the Centre’s SOP for frontline COVID healthcare employees that required the mandatory 14-day quarantine for doctors.

The SOP was issued on 15th May and Mehta said that the 15th May order would be revised and according to the new order, it will allow quarantine period of one week for healthcare staffs. Extension of the quarantine period will be totally based on the healthcare worker’s individual profile.

The government is also going to write to all states and UTs regarding providing alternate accommodations to all healthcare employees and inform the court in next four weeks’ time.

The Health Ministry has already filed a fresh affidavit in the court, notifying that the Centre and the States will give their highest priority for protection of doctors and healthcare employees.

Source: The New Indian Express