Summary
A complaint against a hospital, its operating company, its Chairman and staff over a Rs. 2,500 charge for a test not performed (which the hospital offered to refund), delay in supplying medical records and alleged threats disclosed no criminal offence; billing and records grievances fall under the remedial scheme of the West Bengal Clinical Establishments Act, 2017. The complaint was quashed under Section 482 CrPC.
Issues
- Whether the allegations, taken at face value, disclosed criminal breach of trust, cheating or criminal conspiracy under the IPC.
- Whether the High Court was justified in observing that an offence under Section 504 IPC was made out when neither the complaint nor the summoning order invoked it.
- Whether a billing discrepancy and delay in supplying medical records constituted an offence under Section 34 of the West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Act, 2017.
- Whether the High Court should have quashed the complaint instead of remanding the matter to the Magistrate.
Provisions considered
- Section 482, Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973Applying the Bhajan Lal categories, the Court held that where the complaint, accepted in its entirety, discloses no offence, the High Court should quash it; the High Court failed to exercise that power. (¶¶ 10, 15, 20)
- Section 405 (criminal breach of trust), Indian Penal Code, 1860Requires entrustment creating a fiduciary obligation and dishonest misappropriation; the Rs. 2,500 was paid as part of the hospital bill, with no averment of entrustment, and the hospital offered a refund once the error was raised. (¶ 11)
- Section 420, Indian Penal Code, 1860Cheating needs deception and dishonest intention from the outset; a billing entry for a test not performed, corrected by a refund offer, looked like inadvertence rather than dishonesty. (¶ 12)
- Section 120B, Indian Penal Code, 1860Conspiracy requires a prior agreement; where the underlying offences are not disclosed, a conspiracy charge based on them ordinarily cannot stand, and nothing showed a meeting of minds among the accused, including the company and its Chairman. (¶ 13)
- Section 504, Indian Penal Code, 1860The High Court, on its own, treated general averments that staff discouraged the complainant as a prima facie Section 504 offence; the Supreme Court held there was no occasion to do so. (¶¶ 7, 14)
- Section 7(3), West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Act, 2017Licence conditions impose duties on clinical establishments regarding pricing, records, grievance cells, help desks and billing; the Court relied on them to show that billing and records complaints are regulatory matters. (¶ 17)
- Sections 29, 34, 35 and 36, West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Act, 2017The Act provides an Adjudicating Authority and a Regulatory Commission and penalties for deficiencies under Section 29, with Section 34 reserved for declared offences; merely citing Section 34 without showing how an offence was committed does not permit prosecution. (¶¶ 18, 19)
Held
- Where a complaint, even if accepted entirely at face value, discloses no offence, it is a fit case for quashing under Section 482 CrPC, and the High Court erred in remanding the matter instead of examining whether any offence was made out. (¶¶ 7, 10, 15, 20)
- Criminal breach of trust was not made out: money paid as part of a hospital bill was not shown to have been entrusted for any fiduciary purpose, and there was no dishonest misappropriation, particularly as the hospital offered to refund the wrongly charged amount. (¶ 11)
- Cheating was not made out because a billing discrepancy corrected by an offer of refund indicated inadvertence rather than dishonest intention at the outset; the conspiracy charge could not survive without the foundational offences or any averment of a prior agreement. (¶¶ 12, 13)
- The High Court had no occasion to turn general averments about staff discouraging the complainant into an offence under Section 504 IPC, which neither the complaint nor the summoning order invoked. (¶ 14)
- Grievances about billing and non-supply or delay in supply of medical records are, under the 2017 Act's scheme, primarily deficiencies to be redressed through its adjudicatory mechanism and penalties; they do not become a criminal offence under Section 34 merely because that section is mentioned in the complaint. (¶¶ 16, 17, 18, 19)
- Quashing the criminal complaint does not affect the complainant's civil or statutory remedies. (¶ 21)
Result
Appeals allowed; the High Court judgment dated 16.05.2023 was set aside and Complaint Case No. C-533 of 2021 was quashed, leaving civil and statutory remedies open to the complainant.