Hyderabad: A consumer court has asked Shrestha Orange Hospitals and a `fake’ doctor to pay Rs 40 lakh compensation after a patient died during the first wave of COVID-19.
The hospital had charged the patient's family over Rs 13 lakh, and watched her die 72 days after discharge. The hospital had hired an unqualified doctor to treat the patient.
The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission-II, Hyderabad, passed the order on 17 April 2026, holding Shrestha Orange Hospitals, LB Nagar, and Dr Sai Kumar jointly liable for medical negligence and deficiency in service.
The patient
T. Srilatha, 56, was admitted to Shrestha Orange Hospitals on 6 September 2020 with fever and breathlessness. Her principal diagnosis recorded bilateral pneumonia, ARDS, hypertension, and COVID-19 positive.
The hospital billed her family Rs 13,27,069 over 20 days. She was discharged on 26 September 2020.
The discharge summary carried the hospital's own words: "Patient came with complaint of fever with SOB (breathlessness) since 4 days, for which she was admitted under a pulmonologist and received intravenous medications, oxygen support started. She is improving need further stay in hospital, but they want to get discharged, so discharged on request."
The family maintained that the hospital advised the discharge. The hospital later claimed the family acted against medical advice. It filed no sworn evidence to support that claim.
Srilatha died on 7 December 2020.
The fake doctor
The man listed as the consultant unit chief on her discharge summary was Dr Sai Kumar. He held no MBBS degree.
Her husband, T. Sriramulu, and son T. Chaithanya Kumar, told the commission that Sai Kumar administered the immunosuppressant drug Tocilizumab without supervision, triggering pulmonary fibrosis.
After discharge, the family took Srilatha to Aware Global Hospital, where pulmonologist Dr Sudheer Prasad confirmed the pulmonary fibrosis and told them medicines could buy time, but her life could not be saved.
The LB Nagar police registered FIR No. 1512 of 2020 on 14 December 2020 against both the hospital and Sai Kumar under Sections 304-II, 336, 384, and 420 read with Section 34 IPC, covering culpable homicide, extortion, and cheating.
The hospital's defence
Shrestha Orange Hospitals, managed by Yathati Durga Rani and Yathati Ramesh Babu, denied that Sai Kumar worked there. The hospital claimed he accompanied Srilatha as her personal physician from his Meerpet clinic and that his name appeared on records only to give her confidence.
It argued the 72-day gap between discharge and death broke any chain of liability.
The commission rejected both arguments. The hospital filed written submissions but produced no evidence affidavit, no sworn testimony, and no supporting documents.
The commission stated: "Mere pleadings without proof on oath carry no evidentiary value and cannot be relied upon to deny negligence or deficiency in service."
The line appears twice in the order.
Sai Kumar did not appear before the commission and was proceeded against ex parte.
A second victim, the same doctor
Witness Martha Yadagiri testified that his father, M. Ramaswamy, received treatment at the same hospital between 9 and 24 September 2020 and that Sai Kumar treated him during the same period.
Records showed the hospital itself filed a police complaint against Sai Kumar under FIR No. 1540 of 2020 at LB Nagar police station under Section 420 IPC after the fraud surfaced.
What the commission found
The commission found that "the opposite parties are managing and running their hospital not only with unqualified persons who are none other than fake doctors but also playing with the lives of the patients by attracting gullible public with their big hoardings and advertisements."
It held that "the 1st opposite party acted very negligently in treating the deceased patient, who is the wife of the 1st complainant and mother of the 2nd complainant, and made them to expend more than an amount of Rs 13,27,069 by engaging the 2nd opposite party (fake doctor) service."
The complainants, it recorded, "proved their case against the opposite parties in respect of their negligent acts and deficiencies in services and defective treatment committed by the 1st opposite party by engaging unqualified and fake doctors by filing all their evidence on oath."
The order
The commission held it "just and reasonable to allow this complaint by awarding Rs 40,00,000 towards refund of hospital charges, compensation, consortium, loss of love and affection from the deceased, and damages that cannot be compensated."
The hospital and Sai Kumar must pay jointly and severally. Of the Rs 40 lakh, Rs 25 lakh goes to the husband and Rs 15 lakh to the son, along with Rs 25,000 in litigation costs.
Compliance is due within 45 days of receipt of the order. Default attracts interest at 12% per annum until full realisation.
The commission also directed both complainants to care for T. Lavanya, Srilatha's daughter, who suffers from an ailment and could not participate in the proceedings.
The family filed the case in June 2021. It took nearly five years to reach an order.