KARACHI, Dec 1: Fake death certificates are being issued by the medicolegal officers (MLOs) at the Jinnah Post-graduate Medical Centre (JPMC), according to well-placed sources who said that such certificates had been issued without postmortem essential to ascertain the actual cause of death.

They said that the malpractice came to light when the Police Surgeon Office and high-ups at the JPMC detected one such case and initiated an inquiry against the MLOs who had allegedly handed over the fake certificate to the heirs of a deceased.

The JPMC authorities, however, have been keeping the inquiry pending for unknown reasons for the past 15 days, the sources added.

“Though the Police Surgeon Office and the Health Department fully realize the gravity of the situation, none of them have taken any serious action to check the malpractice,” they regretted.

According to the details of the detected case, the fake death certificate pertained to Dildar Masih and was issued to his relatives after his body was brought to the city’s largest tertiary care unit on Oct 28.

The certificate (No.154635 and dated Oct 28) carried the illegible stamp of Accident & Emergency Department, JPMC. It turned out to be fake and fabricated when tackled for verification. The in-charge of the department, while disowning the certificate, wrote his remarks: “Forged and fabricated/Not issued by the A&E Department.”

Responding to a letter issued to the SI, Tufail Ahmed, from the office of the Additional Police Surgeon (APSO) of the JPMC, the SI held that he had reached the JPMC on Oct 28 to handle the proceedings of the dead body under section 174 CrPC. He stated that he had found the body placed in the Emergency Ward and completed the legal formalities in presence of Dildar Masih’s heirs. The SI claimed that the death certificate was accordingly issued by the MLO, Dr Tayyab, in presence of Dr Paritam.

The APSO had also sought version of the mortuary attendant, Mohammad Tariq Khan, through a similar letter. Mr Khan claimed that he had tried to take the body into the mortuary but Masih’s relatives stopped him from doing so as they did not want postmortem examination to be carried out. The relatives, he added, took the body back to the Emergency Ward where SI, Tufail Ahmed, allowed them to take away the body. He said that Dr Tayyab had given the death certificate to SI Tufail.

In the light of their contradictory versions, the Additional Police Surgeon, Irfan Qureshi, wrote the JPMC authorities that an inquiry be opened immediately to ascertain facts and fix responsibility on the culprits for action. He did mention the issuance of fake death certificate duly signed and stamped, apparently by the MLO and the JPMC authorities. Furthermore, he noted that Dildar Masih’s body was examined by the CMO, Dr Fahmida who referred the case to the medicolegal section. Accordingly, the woman MLO, Dr Kauser Parveen, examined the body vide Medicolegal Certificate No.7653/02 and advised postmortem examination to ascertain the cause of death, Mr Qureshi observed.

During the scrutiny of the record, it transpired that no postmortem examination had been carried out.

In the course of the ensuing inquiry statements of the MLOs, Dr M Tayyab Umrani and Dr Paritam Jasrani, were recorded.

The sources pointed out that neither the inquiry was making progress nor its findings were being made public for the last 15 days.

They further pointed out that apart from this particular case, a number of other such malpractices had been causing problems to the people at the public sector hospitals — JPMC, Civil Hospital and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.

For instance, they added, people were facing great hardship in obtaining medicolegal certificates and death certificates at the emergency wards of all the three hospitals where designated medicolegal departments were functioning