A public interest litigation (PIL) was filed by senior Congress leader Debabrata Saikia in Guwahati High Court against hospitals in the state for allegedly refusing treatment to patients who fail to produce Covid negative reports.

Saikia, while citing several newspapers reports stating the plight of patients who are in need of critical and immediate medical care, said that it was a violation of fundamental right of citizens that they are refused treatment without Covid negative certificates. He also added that many have died due to the same.

"Such people include accident-related critically injured cases, in which urgent medical care is vital and of paramount importance. Resultantly, many people succumbed to their injuries sustained during the accidents," the PIL stated.

The petitioner also claimed that even pregnant women are not admitted to hospitals without a Covid negative certificate.

As per the directive issued by the Union Health Ministry on April, hospitals are not to deny essential critical services to those in need as well as not to insist on Covid test before providing services.

Saikia said that these hospitals were in violation of the directive.

The PIL further states that the actions of the respondents, government of India, Assam government and the state health and family welfare department were malafide and violated fundamental rights of the petitioner as guaranteed under articles 14 and 21 of the constitution.