KERALA MEDICO LEGAL SOCIETY Vs. GOVERNMENT OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The right to dignity and fair treatment is not only available to a living man but also to his dead body. A decent burial of a dead body of a human being immediately after the death, if intended by the kith and kins of that person is far more important than certain legal formalities to be conducted if it is an unnatural death. The obligation of the State to do the needful in such a situation is paramount. The laws of procedure, whether statutory or otherwise can not be a hurdle for an early burial of a dead body, if the relatives and friends of the dead person requested for the same. Nowadays if unfortunately, an unnatural death happened in a family, the bereaved family members of the dead person can not sit in their house, but they have to stand in a queue in front of the police station for early conduct of the inquest of the dead body and thereafter in front of the hospital authorities for early conduct of the postmortem. This is not only the worry of the bereaved family of the dead person but the representatives of the people like local M.L.A(Member of Legislative Assembly), Panchayath presidents, Ward members etc. Everybody will be either in the police station or in the hospital to get the dead body released early so that the relatives can see the dead body finally and they can pay homage to it and do their customary religious rights as per their religious belief.

(2.) The first hurdle for the delay in getting the dead body to the relatives is probably the timing scheduled for the conduct of autopsy which is to be done by Medical experts. From time immemorial, there is a belief that autopsy can not be conducted during the night and it is to be conducted in broad daylight. If we go through the medical jurisprudence and Toxicology Textbook of Mody, it can be seen that as far as possible the postmortem examination should be performed in daylight and not in artificial light. According to medical books, the verification of colour matching is more accurate in natural light than in artificial light. According to the old medical jurisprudence book, the differentiation of various colours under artificial light is misleading and all the striking colours can't be made out easily at night under artificial light. Since much water has flown below the bridge, the technology is now completely changed. The State of Kerala came with a brave decision by way of a Government order in 2015 implementing 24 hours autopsy and accorded sanction to conduct night autopsy in five Government Medical Colleges namely, Thiruvananthapuram, Alappuzha, Kottayam, Trissur, and Kozhikode and also in the General Hospital Kasargod as a pilot project. The M.L.A fund is directed to be utilised to start the facility in Government Hospital, Kasargod. Exhibit P4 is the order.

(3.) When the above Government order was notified, the Kerala Medico-Legal Society represented by its Secretary and another Doctor who is a member of the Forensic Medicine Faculty of Kottayam approached this Court with the following prayers: