No special relief for lady Doctor in fraud case

Mumbai: NP NEWS 24 ONLINE – A 29-year-old woman medical practitioner was denied relief by the Mumbai’s Session court after she was caught in an alleged mediclaim fraud.

A case of cheating was registered with the Khar Police station against the Dr Mayuri Tharwal. The manager of the HDFC Ergo General Insurance company had filed the case, in October 2018.

According to police, ” the policy holders Nandadeep Jadhav and Navin Dhutre had submitted their insurance claims. However when the company went to verify their claims they were hesitant to share details with the company and later withdrew their claims. This created a doubt in the minds of the company and so, they approached the R G Stone Urology and Leprosy Hospital in Khar. The hospital provided the company with a list of people who had furnished mediclaim documents with the insurance company but did not avail treatment in their hospital. Hence, the manager of the insurance company filed a report with the Khar Police.

Woman doctor had moved to court and had applied praying to be granted an anticipatory bail on the grounds that she had just delivered a child in May, and that she needs to breastfeed the infant.

The court refused to accept her reason and denied granting her any protection against arrest.

The court in its orders held that the lady is a BEMS and a medical professional, who was part of the hospital’s mediclaim panel.

“In my judgment, she was well aware about the consequences of the fraudulent act committed by her in connivance with a co-accused. Being a medical professional, she ought not have engaged in such fraudulent means. It can be said that she did all of this with full knowledge of consequences. Therefore, although she needs to breastfeed her child born on May 5, 2018, she is not entitled to grant of order of anticipatory bail on such an emotional ground.”

The court order observed that the police case shows that the, co-accused Sharma used to allegedly get the documents, while Tharwal used to sign those documents. Accordingly, on August 3,2017, she had received the claim amount of Rs 2,99,433­ in her account and thereafter she had returned Rs 1,49,400­ to the insurance bearer, while the rest of the money was allegedly kept by her.