SC dismisses doctors' plea in Rahul Mahajan drug case

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday declined to give any relief to six doctors of Indraprastha Apollo Hospital and five others seeking quashing of the criminal proceedings against them for allegedly tampering with evidence in the Rahul Mahajan drug abuse case.
    
A bench of Justices A K Mathur and Aftab Alam while dismissing a petition filed by the doctors directed them to approach the trial court for relief.
    
Eleven Apollo staffers including six doctors, who were charged with misleading the investigation and tampering with the evidence, in a special leave petition (SLP) before the apex court sought quashing of the FIR which was registered by the police at Sarita Vihar police station following ACMM's orders in June 2006.
    
Earlier in February this year, the Delhi High Court had rejected the petitioners' submission that their names have not figured in the main FIR lodged against Mahajan and five others for drugs abuse and criminal conspiracy, following which they had come on an SLP in the Supreme Court.
    
The hospital staff have alleged that the investigation in the second FIR was mala fide as SHO, Tughlak Road, was already investigating into the main case and therefore the probe launched against them by the Sarita Vihar police was "discriminatory" and "arbitrary" in nature.
     
The case was registered with an ulterior motive to damage the reputation of the hospital, they claimed.
    
Rahul Mahajan, son of late BJP leader Pramod Mahajan, was admitted to hospital on June one, 2006 following alleged drug consumption.