Section 200 punishes any person in charge of a hospital, whether public or private, and whether run by the Central Government, a State Government, local bodies, or any other person, who contravenes Section 397 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, with imprisonment of up to one year, or fine, or both.
Verified against the National Crime Records Bureau's official BNS–IPC concordance (Sankalan Portal), which maps Section 200 to old IPC Section 166B.
| BNS section | IPC, 1860 equivalent | Category |
|---|---|---|
| 200 | 166B | Old-law text not compared |
The wording of old IPC Section 166B is not reproduced on this page, so no word-by-word comparison with it is stated here; readers who need that comparison should consult the amended IPC directly.
Whoever, being in charge of a hospital, public or private, whether run by the Central Government, the State Government, local bodies or any other person, contravenes the provisions of section 397 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both.
Source: Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (Act No. 45 of 2023), as published in the Gazette of India Extraordinary.
Whoever is in charge of a hospital — public or private, and regardless of whether it is run by the Central Government, a State Government, local bodies, or any other person — and who contravenes the requirements laid down in Section 397 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, commits this offence. The provision is drafted to apply uniformly across the entire range of hospital operators, without distinguishing between government-run and privately-run institutions.
These judgment(s) relate to Section 200 as a whole rather than to one specific sub-section, and so are presented together here rather than alongside a particular clause above.
A scooterist injured in a road accident was refused treatment at the nearest hospital and directed to a different, distant hospital authorised to handle medico-legal cases; he died before reaching it. On a public-interest writ, the Supreme Court held that preserving human life is of paramount importance, and that every doctor — government or private — has an absolute, unqualified professional obligation to provide immediate emergency medical aid, irrespective of whether the case is medico-legal in nature. Procedural formalities under the Criminal Procedure Code or police rules cannot be allowed to delay or obstruct that duty; those formalities must follow after the patient's life has been attended to, not before.
Currency check: decided August 1989; a foundational authority on a doctor’s duty to render emergency aid under Article 21; no adverse subsequent history found.
Any person in charge of a hospital, whether public or private, and regardless of which government or body operates it, who contravenes Section 397 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023.
Imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year, or fine, or both.
The official concordance maps this section to old IPC Section 166B, whose wording is not reproduced on this page. Readers who need a word-by-word comparison should consult the amended IPC directly.