Five arrested in Shine Hospital case

The LB Nagar police on Friday arrested five persons including Shine Children’s Hospital managing director V Sunil Kumar Reddy and duty doctor Hari Krishna, holding them responsible for Monday’s fire accident in the hospital’s Neo Natal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), which killed a 4-month-old baby boy.

Apart from Reddy and Krishna, the police arrested duty nurses Sravanthi and Shanthi Deepika and electrician Basheeruddin. Around 2.21 am on Monday, a fire reportedly broke out from a refrigerator and the subsequent blast in the air conditioned NICU on the fourth floor of the building, killed one baby and injured four other babies.

Following a complaint from the child’s father D Naresh, a constable, the police booked a case against the hospital management. LB Nagar Inspector V Ashok Reddy said the management had failed to install fire safety equipment like fire alarm system and extinguishing sprinklers as per the norms.

The hospital was being run without necessary permission from the Director, (Enforcement), Vigilance and Disaster Management of



Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation. They had also failed to procure a No-Objection Certificate from the Fire Services department. Krishna was negligent in his duty to protect the newborn babies and did not reach the NICU immediately when the mishap occurred.

Sravanthi was supposed to be on duty in NICU, but abandoned it from 1.57 am. She had closed the door and left, while Deepika, who was on duty in the pediatric ICU adjacent to NICU, did nothing to rescue the infants. Basheeruddin, whose duty was to maintain all the equipment including electric fire hazards, refrigerator and air conditioners in the NICU, failed to prevent the malfunction that triggered the fire, police said.

Based on evidence collected, the police added Section 31 read with 19 of Telangana Fire Services Act-1999 along with Section 304A (Causing death by negligence), 336 (Act endangering life or personal safety of others) and 338 (Causing grievous hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) of the IPC against the five persons and arrested them.