Strange that petitioner calls himself doctor without qualification: Karnataka HC junks paramedics plea for registration of clinic [Read Order]

The Karnataka High Court expressed its shock recently while noting that a man was posing as a doctor and prescribing medicines in Karnatakas Kolar in spite of not being a qualified professional. 
 

He is not a doctor as defined under the Act. He is also not one of those practitioners as defined under the Act. Without being so, he claims to have practiced for ages now at Kolar and would obviously be even prescribing medicine. His practice as averred in the petition is allopathy as well and calls himself a doctor. It is rather strange as to how the petitioner addresses himself as a practicing doctor for all these years. , Justice M Nagaprasanna noted in the order. 
 

The Court was hearing a plea seeking to quash the District Health & Family Welfare Officer and Member Secretarys decision [under the Karnataka Private Medical Establishments Act 2007] declining to issue registration certificate to the petitioner for his Sangeetha Clinic.
The petitioner was seeking to get himself registered under the Act as he has been practicing in the name and style of Sangeetha Clinic for several years. 
 

The Court noted that the previously the High Court had directed that the petitioners application cant be kept pending for long under the Act. However, amid all this jugglery, what is necessary to be noticed is the qualification of the petitioner. 
 

It was revealed that petitioner has Diploma in Community Medical Services with Essential Drugs. This is a Diploma conferred by the Indian Council of Medico Technicals and Health Care, a society registered under the Societies Registration Adhiniyam, Kanpur. This does not make a provate medical practitioner under the Act, the Court noted. 
 

If the nature of the course that the petitioner has undergone is considered on the bedrock of the provisions noted hereinabove, it would become unmistakably clear that the qualification possessed by the petitioner does not make him a Private Medical Practitioner as found in Section 2(k) of the Act, as paramedical study that the petitioner has undergone is not the one that is found in Section 2(k). That Section 2(k) itself is exhaustive and elaborate in bringing 15 within its sweep even physiotherapy as they are all Degrees or Diplomas obtained by those medical practitioners.
 

And so, the petitioner is not a medical practitioner. He is a para medical practitioner. Being a para medical practitioner, he is not entitled to any registration under the Act, which is sine qua non for continuation of practice as a medical practitioner. He is not a doctor as defined under the Act. 
 

The order also stated that petitioners clinic would be seized and the seizure would be axiomatic, as it is a consequence of non-registration of the clinic by a doctor who has no qualification. No fault can be found with this, the court opined. 
 

Before closing the order, the judge also had a strong message from such people. 
 

Time has come to pull the curtain down on such people who are practicing medicine without qualification and hoodwinking poor people in rural areas.

[Read Order]