Police to wind up Shamna Tasnim case

Kochi: Even as the state government suspended two doctors at Ernakulam Government Medical College (EMC) pending detailed inquiry by Joint DME into the death of medico Shamna Tasnim, the Kochi police who investigated the criminal case of medical negligence is readying to wind up the case.

"We are winding up the case since the medical board headed by the Ernakulam District Medical Officer has reported that there was no medical negligence. We had collected evidence from eye witnesses and we did not find anything to proceed with a case in this regard," investigating officer Assistant Commissioner of Police Thrikkakara Binoy M told DC.

He said that for winding up the case, the police won't be making any proceedings in the court. "We would do it at our end. We can't proceed any further as there is no medical negligence detected," said Mr Binoy. He also said that he did not notice any discrepancies in documentation of the sequence of incidents leading to the death of Shamna by nurses and doctors.

Interestingly, the inference and remarks in the medical report by Dr Madhu V. and Dr Paul Thomas, specialists invited to the medical board - the former an anesthetist and the latter a cardiologist, both at Ernakulam General Hosptial - which found "no gross medical negligence", had observed that there was disparity in documentation.

Meanwhile, the state government is yet to make public the report of the three-member panel headed by joint DME Dr K. Sreekumari into the medico's death, based on which two doctors of EMC were suspended. The kith and kin of Ms Shamna are peeved over this. The medical report of the three--member panel headed by DMO Dr N.K. Kuttappan is also yet to be made public.