Bring RMPs under penal ambit, HC tells Telangana govt

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad HC on Tuesday directed the State of Telangana to bring Rural Medical Practitioners into the penal purview of the state to prevent these RMPs from administering medicines to people in a reckless manner.


The bench of Chief Justice T B Radhakrishnan and Justice V Ramasubramanian sought to know from the state as to why it did not do so till now. The bench was hearing a public interest petition filed by Mahesh Kumar, President of Health Care Reforms Doctors Association that challenged GO 1273 issued in 2009 allowing RMPs to run primary health clinics in rural and remote areas. The bench was critical about the fact that the state did not provide any penal provisions for dealing with errant RMPs.

Chief Justice Radhakrishnan recalled incidents of kidney failure patients from Chattisgarh relying on such RMPs and quacks from Odisha who administer Brufen tablets to such patients. "Brufen should not be given to such patients. But these quacks are giving such medicines to patients. Do you have a law to catch such quacks?," he asked. "There is no primary legislation in place to deal with such unauthorised medical practitioners", the bench said and gave four months time to the state to study the experts committee report and bring out appropriate mechanism to deal with RMPs.