“After an agonizing 28-year battle, the state government has finally relented in its duty to compensate 75-year-old Mallakkara Kamalakshi, who lost her left eye during surgery at Kasaragod District Hospital. This change of heart came just seven days after the Subordinate Court in Hosdurg resorted to attaching the Scorpio belonging to Kanhangad Regional Divisional Officer (RDO), with the aim of recovering the approximate sum of Rs 8 lakh as compensation for Kamalakshi’s ordeal.
On the 27th of September, Additional Government Pleader K P Ajay Kumar conveyed to the sub-court that the government would release the full compensation amount to Kamalakshi within a span of 10 days. This decision followed the attachment of the RDO’s four-year-old Scorpio, valued at Rs 6 lakh by the Motor Vehicle Department, on September 20th. Kamalakshi’s advocate, Manoj Kumar K, revealed that they were prepared to initiate auction proceedings for the car when the AGP announced the government’s intention to pay the owed amount.
Kamalakshi’s tragic story began in 1995 when, working as a cook at Islamia Aided Lower Primary School in Kadangod, Kasaragod’s Cheruvathur panchayat, she developed cataracts in both her eyes. Dr. Thresiamma, an eye surgeon at the District Hospital, conducted cataract surgery on her right eye on June 8th and her left eye on June 23rd of the same year. Unfortunately, a bacterial infection during the procedure forced the removal of her left eye in a hospital in Mangaluru, and she subsequently underwent laser treatment to restore her vision in the right eye, incurring costs of around Rs 5 lakh for these procedures.
In 1997, Kamalakshi filed a petition in the Hosdurg Subordinate Court seeking Rs 3 lakh in compensation from the government. The legal battle ensued for over two decades, with the court initially demanding a deposit of Rs 30,000 to admit her petition. After seeking relief in the high court to remove this financial constraint, the case persisted.
Advocate Manoj Kumar took over the case in 2014, succeeding his late father, Adv K Purushottaman, a former CPM MLA from Udma. After 21 long years, in 2018, the Hosdurg Subordinate Court finally ruled in Kamalakshi’s favor, ordering the government to pay her Rs 2.3 lakh as compensation, plus interest. However, the LDF government chose to appeal this decision in the High Court of Kerala, which took three more years to dismiss the appeal in January 2023.
Rather than fulfilling its compensation obligations, the government, in August, handed over a 19-year-old Tata Spacio from the Health Department to the court as collateral for recovering the funds. The Motor Vehicle Department assessed this vehicle’s value at a mere Rs 30,000. Over the years, the compensation amount ballooned to nearly Rs 8 lakh. Kamalakshi’s lawyer resisted putting the Spacio up for auction and instead pressed for the attachment of another vehicle.
Ultimately, the court’s decision to attach the RDO’s car seems to have spurred the government into action. Nevertheless, in the course of these arduous 28 years since 1995, Kamalakshi’s vision in her remaining right eye has significantly deteriorated.”
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