Aneesh Singh vs The State of Bihar

IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA
Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.6457 of 2024
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1. Aneesh Singh Son of Ram Sagar Singh Resident of Village - Raghuram
Tola, Aunta, P.O. and P.S. - Hathidah, District - Patna.
2. Geeta Devi Wife of Krishna Madhav Pandey Resident of Village - Maranchi,
Uttree Gandhi Tola, P.O. and P.S.- Maranchi, District - Patna.
3. Madhuree Devi Wife of Sadan Prasad Singh Ward no. 4, Resident of Village
- Rampur Dumra, P.O. and P.S.- Maranchi, District - Patna.
4. Mani Bhushan Singh Son of Parshuram Singh Resident of Village -
Raghuram Tola, Aunta, P.O.and P.S. - Hathidah, District - Patna.
5. Reema Kumari Wife of Pankaj Kumar Resident of Village - Raghuram Tola,
Aunta, P.O.and P.S. - Hathidah, District - Patna.
6. Vishakhi Devi Wife of Shiv Kumar Singh Resident of Village - Maranchi,
P.O. and P.S.- Maranchi, District - Patna.
7. Anant Kumar Sharma Son of Baliram Prasad Singh Resident of VIllage -
Maranchi, Uttri Tola, Pratappur, P.O. and P.S.- Maranchi, District - Patna.
8. Krishna Murari Son of Rama Shakar Singh Resident of Village - Maranchi,
Ward No. 3, P.O. and P.s.- Maranchi, District - Patna.
... ... Petitioners
Versus
1. The State of Bihar through the Chief Secretary, Bihar, Patna.
2. The Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Health, Bihar, Patna.
3. The Executive Director, State Health Samiti, Bihar, Patna.
4. The District Magistrate Patna.
5. The Civil Surgeon-cum-Chief Medical Officer, Patna.
6. The Additional District Magistrate, Patna.
7. The Additional Chief Medical Officer, Patna.
8. The Authorized Senior Incharge Medical Officer, Patna.
9. The Circle Officer, Mokama, District - Patna.
... ... Respondents
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Appearance :
For the Petitioner/s : Mr. Jainendra Kumar, Advocate
For the State Health Society : Mr. K.K. Sinha, Advocate
For the Respondent/s : Mr. Standing Counsel 18
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CORAM: HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE ALOK KUMAR
ORAL JUDGMENT
Date : 02-09-2026
Heard learned counsel for the petitioners and

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learned counsel for the State.
2. The present writ application has been filed by the
petitioners with the following main relief/reliefs:
“(i) To issue writ in the nature of Mandamus against
the respondents/authorities.
(ii) To pay compensation amount of Rs.400000/- (Four
Lakhs) to the each petitioners under the Scheme of
Bihar Covid Sahayata Yojna 2022 as their family
members have died during Covid-19 period.
(iii) To any other relief/reliefs in the facts and
circumstances of the case.”
3. The case of the petitioners, in brief, is that the
family members of all eight petitioners contracted Covid-19
during the second wave of the pandemic and died in harness
between 20.04.2021 and 20.05.2021, while under
treatment/home isolation in the Mokama and Maranchi areas of
District-Patna. The deaths of the petitioners' family members
find due mention in the serial/line list of Covid-19 deaths
compiled and forwarded by the State Health Society, Bihar.
Representations for release of compensation under the Bihar
Covid Sahayata Yojna, 2022 were made by the petitioners
before the Upper Samaharta Parbandhan, Patna, supported by
death certificates, medical prescriptions and bank statements.

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4. Learned counsel for the petitioners submitted,
that the genuineness of the Covid-19 test reports and the fact of
death of the petitioner’s family members due to Covid-19 have
never been disputed by the respondent-authorities at any stage,
and that the claims came to be rejected solely on the technical
ground that the test in each case was conducted at a laboratory
situated at Mokama, which was not formally notified/authorised
by the State Government for RT-PCR/RAT/TruNat testing.
5. Learned counsel for the petitioners further
submitted that the petitioners in C.W.J.C. No.13671 of 2023,
whose family members were tested at the very same
unauthorised laboratory at Mokama and whose claims were
rejected on the identical ground, were granted the benefit of
reconsideration by this Court, pursuant to which compensation
came to be released to them and that the present petitioners,
being similarly situated in every material particular, are entitled
to parity of treatment, and that denial of the like benefit to them,
without any distinguishing feature having been shown by the
State, would offend the Right to Equality.
6. Learned counsel for the State/respondents
submitted, that the claims of the present petitioners were duly
examined at two tiers, firstly by the District Committee headed

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by the Civil Surgeon, Patna, and thereafter by the State-level
three-member Committee constituted by the Executive Director,
State Health Samiti, Bihar and were successively rejected, first
on 03.02.2023 and subsequently, upon re-examination, on
18.07.2024, for the reason that the Covid-19 test relied upon by
each of the petitioners had been conducted at a laboratory not
authorised by the Government for RT-PCR/RAT/TruNat testing,
and consequently did not satisfy the prescribed eligibility
criteria.
7. Learned counsel for the State/respondents further
submitted, that the rejection of the petitioner’s claims is a
considered decision taken by the competent expert Committees
after due verification of records and that no illegality or
arbitrariness attaches to the process of scrutiny, and that this
Court, exercising writ jurisdiction, ought not to substitute its
own assessment for the factual determination arrived
8. Having heard learned counsel for the respective
parties and perused the materials on record, this Court finds it
necessary, before adverting to the rival contentions, to examine
the legal framework governing eligibility for Covid-19 ex-
gratia/compensation claims, as laid down by the Hon'ble
Supreme Court and as applied by this Court in an identical fact-

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situation.
9. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of
Gaurav Kumar Bansal v. Union of India & Anr. (M.A.
No.1120 of 2021 in W.P.(C) No.539 of 2021) , while giving
effect to the guidelines dated 03.09.2021 and 11.09.2021 issued
respectively by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare/ICMR
and the National Disaster Management Authority, laid down the
eligibility criteria for treating a death as one caused by Covid-19
for the purpose of ex-gratia assistance under Section 12(iii) of
the Disaster Management Act, 2005. On a conjoint reading of
paragraph 11(i) to 11(ix) of the said order, a case qualifies as a
Covid-19 death where any one of the following conditions is
satisfied: (i) the deceased was diagnosed Covid-19 positive
through an RT-PCR/Molecular Test/RAT, or was clinically
determined to be a Covid-19 case through investigation by a
treating physician while admitted in a hospital/in-patient
facility; (ii) death occurred within thirty days of such positive
test or clinical determination, irrespective of whether death took
place inside or outside the hospital; (iii) the deceased, having
been admitted as a Covid-19 case, continued in the same
admission beyond thirty days and died subsequently; (iv) a
Medical Certificate of Cause of Death (MCCD) in Form 4/4A

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has been issued under Section 10 of the Registration of Birth
and Death Act, 1969, treating the death as Covid-19 related; and
(v) the deceased died by suicide within thirty days of being
diagnosed Covid-19 positive.
10. It is significant to note that nowhere in the said
eligibility criteria does the accreditation, empanelment or
authorisation status of the testing laboratory that conducted the
RT-PCR/RAT test find mention as a disqualifying factor. The
touchstone remains the fact and timing of a positive diagnosis or
clinical determination, corroborated by contemporaneous
medical records, and not the administrative status of the
laboratory that generated the report.
11. This position finds direct support in the
decision of this Court in C.W.J.C. No.13671 of 2023 (Sushila
Devi & Manoj Kumar v. State of Bihar & Ors.) , where an
identical question fell for consideration — namely, whether a
claim for ex-gratia compensation can be declined merely
because the Covid-19 test was conducted at a laboratory not
formally notified or authorised by the State Government. It was
an admitted position in that case that no laboratory in Mokama,
Patna, stood authorised by the State Government, and that
Covid-19 patients could not reasonably be expected, at the

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height of the pandemic, to first ascertain from a government
website which laboratory stood authorised and thereafter travel
to it for testing, given the constraints of time, transport and
access prevailing at the relevant period.
12. The ratio of Sushila Devi (supra), read with the
eligibility criteria laid down in Gaurav Kumar Bansal (supra),
leads to the conclusion that non-authorisation of the testing
laboratory, by itself and without more, cannot be elevated to a
ground of ineligibility so long as (i) the factum of a positive
Covid-19 diagnosis or clinical determination is not disputed,
and (ii) the death otherwise falls within the temporal and clinical
criteria set out in paragraph 11 of Gaurav Kumar Bansal. To
hold otherwise would be to read into the Supreme Court's
guidelines a disqualifying condition that the guidelines
themselves do not contain, and would defeat the beneficial and
welfare object underlying the ex-gratia scheme.
13. In the present case, it is not in dispute that the
family members of the petitioners died during the second wave
of the Covid-19 pandemic in the year 2021. Their claims stand
supported by death certificates, medical prescriptions, bank
statements and other requisite documents, and are duly reflected
in the State Health Committee's own serial list of Covid-19

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deaths at Serial Nos.11, 14, 15, 18, 19, 23, 24 and 37. The
claims were examined and were on the singular ground that the
Covid-19 test relied upon had been conducted at a laboratory
not authorised for RT-PCR/RAT/TruNat testing.
14. This Court finds that the rejection, being
founded solely on the administrative status of the testing
laboratory, is indistinguishable in substance from the ground
held unsustainable in C.W.J.C. No.13671 of 2023 The
petitioners, being similarly situated to the petitioners in Sushila
Devi (supra), and their claims suffering from the very same
infirmity of reasoning, are entitled to parity of treatment
15. It is important to reiterate that in a welfare
state, the government has a binding constitutional and statutory
duty under Article 21 and the Disaster Management Act, 2005,
to act as an active guardian of public welfare, ensuring just and
proper relief and financial compensation to citizens harmed or
lost during national health crisis like Covid-19. The state
authorities cannot reject claims simply on technicalities. The
Constitution does not conceive the state as a distant spectator to
human suffering, but as an active guardian of welfare and
dignity.
16. In view of the above, the authority concerned is

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hereby directed to reconsider the claims of all the petitioners
within four weeks from the date of receipt or production of a
certified copy of this order. Further, if on such consideration the
petitioners are found eligible, the compensation shall be paid
under the Bihar Covid-19 Sahayata Yojana 2022, along with any
consequential ex-gratia benefits, and the same shall be released
to them within a period of four weeks thereafter.
17. Accordingly, t he present Writ petition stands
disposed of in terms of the aforesaid directions.
18. Pending I.As, if any, stands disposed of.

(Alok Kumar, J)
Manish Kumar
AFR/NAFR A. F. R.
CAV DATE 17.08.2026
Uploading Date 02.09.2026
Transmission Date N.A