Free mentally challenged persons kept in chains within 6 hrs: U’khand HC to govt

NAINITAL: In an unprecedented order meant to extend '

basic human dignity

to the mentally challenged',

Uttarakhand high court

(HC) on Friday while hearing a

public interest litigation

which cited TOI reports of

mentally challenged people

being kept tied in chains in Udham Singh Nagar and Rudraparayag districts directed the administrations of both the districts to ensure that the affected persons “are freed within six hours and admitted in a suitable

health facility

within 24 hours.”

The division bench of justices Rajiv Sharma and Sharad Kumar Sharma also directed the state government to pay Rs 50,000 to the guardians of the

mentally challenged

people and fix their pension at Rs 5000 per month. The 56 page detailed order with various citations and 28 operative directives dated June 1 remarked, “Every person with mental illness is entitled to clean, safe and hygienic environment, adequate sanitary conditions, reasonable facilities for leisure, recreation, education and religious practices, food, proper clothing to protect such person from exposure of his body to maintain his dignity, and not be subjected to compulsory tonsuring (shaving of head hair), to be protected from all forms of physical, verbal, emotional and sexual abuse in any mental health establishments run by the State and granted permission by any private institution provided approval by it.”

The order cited various guidelines, directives and reports including 10 principles of Division of Mental Health & Prevention of Substance Abuse, World Health Organization, Geneva 1996, Department of Mental Health and Substance Dependence, Non-communicable Diseases and Mental health, World Health Organization, Geneva 2003, WHO’s Global Burden of Disease 2001, a research by Pratima Murty, B.C. Malathesh, C. Naveen Kumar and Suresh Bada Math titled ‘Mental Health and the law’ authored by reported in 2016 Dec in Indian Journal of Psychiatry and articles titled ‘Lifestyle and Mental Health’, Roger Walsh, University of California, Irvine College of Medicine.

The order cited the news item published in TOI on December 28, 2017 titled ‘Mentally disabled girl kept chained for 3 years’ which was placed on record as and annexure in the PIL. The report was about a 14-year-old mentally disabled girl named Chandni from Rudrapur, Udham Singh Nagar district who had been kept chained for years by her parents because her father being a daily wager unable to provide the treatment.

The order also mentioned another report by TOI about a boy in Rudraprayag named Pankaj Rana (22) who has been kept chained and is suffering from ‘quadriparesis’ which renders limbs immobile as well as aphasia which affects the comprehension of speech. The mother of the man is a widow and due to lack of money, she cannot take him to the hospital for treatment.

Taking note of the condition of these and other patients across the state the court remarked, “These children, at times, do not even get proper food, care and medicines. These children are forced to live in miserable conditions. They are deprived of their fundamental and statutory rights. The government agencies have failed to protect these children. The mentally disturbed children, more particularly females, are sexually exploited. These children, due to their disability, are not in a position to complain about the torture or sexual offences committed against them.”

In various other directions pertaining to welfare of mentally challenged people in the state, the HC also directed the state government to “prepare a comprehensive policy for rehabilitating the mentally disturbed children and patients, to conduct an epidemiological survey data in the state to determine the mentally retarded/disturbed children through National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore within six months and to set up a Centre for Human Rights, Ethics, Law and Mental Health.” The division bench also directed the state government to ensure that no person with mental illness is subjected to electro-seclusion or solitary confinement.

The bench further adding more directives ordered the state government “to provide mental healthcare and treatment to all the persons with mental illness at an affordable cost, of good quality, available in sufficient quantity, accessible geographically and without any discrimination”, “to incorporate mental health service into general service at all levels including primary health centers in all health programmes”, “to ensure that no person with mental illness including children and illiterate persons are transferred to long distances to access mental health service.”

The court in the order also added that all the medical officers of the prison or jail will send quarterly reports to the concerned board certifying therein that there are no prisoners with mental illness in the prison or jail, that theperson in-charge of the state run custodial institution (including beggars homes, orphanages, women’s protection homes and children homes) is directed to ensure that any resident of the institution has, or is likely to have, a mental illness, he shall take such resident of the institution to the nearest mental health establishment run or funded by the appropriate government for assessment and treatment, to frame the Policy, as undertaken, to register the children suffering from mental illness within six months, to open more “Mental Care Establishments” taking into consideration the large number of persons suffering from mental illness for their proper treatment, protection.

The division bench also directed that every police officer in Uttarakhand will take under protection “any person found wandering at large within the limits of the police station whom the officer has reason to believe has mental illness and is incapable of taking care of himself”, to send “every person taken into protection” to the nearest public health establishment. The order also remarked that it “shall also be the duty of every police officer to report to the Magistrate if any person, suffering from mental illness, is being ill-treated or neglected.”

The court further directed the state government to frame laws under Mental Healthcare Act, 2017to design and implement programmes for the promotion of mental health and prevention of mental illness in the state, to take all necessary measures to give due publicity to the Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 through public media, including television, radio, print and online media at regular intervals, to ensure that no person or organization establishes or runs mental health establishment unless registered with the authority constituted under the Act, to admit people suffering from mental illness shall be admitted in the “Establishment” as per Section 86 of the Act, to frame the Policy, as undertaken, to register the children suffering from mental illness within six months, to open more Mental Care Establishments taking into consideration the large number of persons suffering from mental illness for their proper treatment, protection and care, to ensure that henceforth, no mentally disturbed/retarded person is found on the streets.

“The concerned SSP/SPs are directed to shift them to the nearest mental health institutions/place of safety,’ said the court.