From Our Bureau
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday pulled up Baba Ramdev for the advertisements by his firm Patanjali to discredit allopathy and its practising doctors during the Covid-19 pandemic and asked the Centre to restrain him.
A bench headed by Chief Justice NV Ramana and comprising Justices Hima Kohli and C.T. Ravikumar said: “Why is Baba Ramdev accusing allopathy doctors? He popularised Yoga. That is good. But he should not criticise other systems.”
Without mincing words, CJI Ramana slammed Ramdev for deriding other medicine systems and accusing the doctors as if they were “killers” and asking “what is the guarantee that Ayurveda he propagates will cure all diseases?”
Advocate Prabhat Bajaj, appearing for the Indian Medical Association (IMA), said representations were made to the authorities but there was no response. Citing the advertisements, he said: “It says that doctors were taking allopathy, but still they died due to Covid. If this goes on unabated, it will cause serious prejudice against us.”
The Chief Justice asked Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, to take instructions on the misleading advertisements by Patanjali. How can Ramdev and Patanjali allege through advertisements in the media that the allopathic doctors are killers, the Bench asked.
The Court also sought the Centre’s response on the IMA allegation of a smear campaign against the Covid-19 vaccination drive and modern medicine.
