New Delhi: On Saturday night, Piyush Pal, a budding documentary filmmaker, lay bleeding on the road for 30 minutes in south Delhi’s Panchsheel Park area, with no one paying heed to him.
Pal, who had crashed into another bike on the road, struggled to survive in hospital for the next three days and finally breathed his last Tuesday. His mobile phone, wallet and GoPro camera were reportedly stolen while he was lying on the road.
After 30 minutes, it was a passer-by travelling with his brother who finally stopped to tend to Pal. The good samaritan, his brother and a bike rider managed to get Pal to a nearby hospital in an auto, from where he was shifted to another hospital for lack of facilities in the first.
The incident exposes yet again, if not the apathy, at least the definite lack of legal awareness among the general public about the good samaritan law instituted in 2016 — a fear that a phone call to the police or ambulance, or taking an injured to the hospital will result in them being harassed, heckled or hassled at the police station, hospital and courts.
On 31 December last year, beautician Anjali Singh’s scooty was hit by a car in Delhi’s Sultanpuri. She fell off, got stuck in the car’s wheels and was dragged by the driver for several kilometres till Kanjhawala.
Her friend Nidhi, who was on the scooty with Anjali and witness to the accident, didn’t initially inform the police or call for help. Sources in the police said Nidhi told them that both of them fell separately after the accident and she went back to her house because she was scared.
“She said she was intoxicated and felt hopeless. She didn’t want anyone to question her so she fled the spot,” a police source had told ThePrint. By the time Anjali’s lifeless body was found, she was long dead with her skin and clothes stripped off.
In December 2012, physiotherapy intern Jyoti Singh was beaten, gangraped and tortured in a private bus in south Delhi and later dumped naked and bleeding on the road along with her companion. Several cars passed by without heeding their cries for help.
The Good Samaritan Law, 2016, says any bystander who takes a victim to hospital “should be allowed to leave immediately” and without being asked any questions.
The guidelines add: A “good samaritan should not be forced to share his/her contact details, if he is unwilling to do so, unless he volunteers for the same.”
But, “there is lack of awareness among the public about how the good samaritan law protects them. They are apprehensive that they will land in trouble with the police or courts if they assist and help an accident victim or call the police or ambulance,” said a senior officer in Delhi Police.
He added: “Moreover, most people don’t trust the police. This has a lot to do with the image instilled in the minds of the common people that the police will interrogate them, take their contact details and keep asking them to come to the police station. They also think that they will become part of the legal procedures automatically.”
Senior criminal lawyer Shilpi Jain agreed that while it’s been years since the good samaritan law was implemented, at the ground level the change has been minuscule.
“There is a vacuum in law, bystanders aren’t legally bound to help accident victims and to assist someone who is injured requires a higher moral ground. People still fear harassment. Our police and hospital staff need to be more sensitised in this matter, so that when a good samaritan approaches them with an injured person, they make them feel respected and not heckle them,” Jain told ThePrint.
Speaking to ThePrint, Suman Nalwa, Delhi Police spokesperson said, “It [the law and the guidelines under it] has been reiterated on many platforms like radio and other media interviews, to create more awareness about the good samaritan law and how it protects those individuals who assist and help those in injured in accidents and [victims of] other medical emergencies”.
Nalwa, however, said that this hasn’t been done as a stand alone campaign by them.
Also Read: 5 arrested after 20-year-old Delhi woman dies as car hits scooter, drags her body for 4 km
What the law says?
According to the website of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, a good samaritan is a person who in good faith, without expectation of payment or reward, and without any duty of care or special relationship, voluntarily comes forward to administer immediate assistance or emergency care to a person injured in an accident, or crash, or emergency medical condition, or emergency situation.
In 2012, a PIL was filed by SaveLIFE Foundation in the Supreme Court, requesting it to safeguard good samaritans who come forward to help the injured. In March 2016, the SC passed an order giving the “force of law” to guidelines issued by the road ministry for the protection of good Samaritans in 2015. The court made the guidelines legally binding for all states and Union Territories.
Under the guidelines, a person without any relationship with the injured can come forward to provide assistance in the form of emergency care in an accident, crash or emergency medical condition. The law protects such good samaritans from harassment over the actions being taken by them to save the lives of road accident or medical emergency victims.
Further any person, except an eyewitness, who informs the police of an accident resulting in death or injury doesn’t need to reveal his or her personal details like full name, address or phone number. The individual will also not be asked by the police to enter these details in registers and other records, according to the Good Samaritan Law.
Moreover, if a good samaritan agrees to be a police witness, he or she should be treated with utmost respect and care. According to the law, the recording of the statement will be done by an officer in plain clothes and if the person needs to visit the police station where the case is registered, he or she will have to be given the same in writing, asking them to come over.
In case the good samaritan claims to be an eyewitness, he or she is allowed to provide evidence in the form of an affidavit. The deputy commissioner of police or superintendent of police of an area were made responsible for ensuring that the guidelines are followed.
In 2020, a new section, 134A, for the protection of good samaritans who aid road accident victims was inserted in the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act, 2019.
The section states that the good samaritan will not be discriminated against on the basis of religion, caste, creed, sex, or nationality. He or she isn’t liable for any civil or criminal action for any injury or death of an accident victim involving a motor vehicle if any such injury or death occurred from the good samaritan’s “negligence in acting or failing to act while rendering emergency medical or non-medical care or assistance”.
However, a study by SaveLIFE Foundation conducted across 11 Indian cities in 2018 found that, in spite of the guidelines for protection of good samaritans, only 29 percent respondents (among a total of 3,667 people) were willing to escort an injured to hospital, a meagre 28 percent were willing to call an ambulance and only 12 percent were willing to call the police. Further, only 16 percent respondents were aware of the good samaritan law.
“Three out of four people in the country are hesitant to help injured accident victims on roads due to fear of police harassment, detention at hospitals, and prolonged legal formalities. Even if someone wants to help, these factors stop them from doing so,” the ministry of road transport states on its website.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
Also Read: Wearing helmet not enough, fastening it properly saves lives. Govt must enforce existing law