Comprehension
“As a matter of fact, when a patient is admitted to the highly commercial hospital … a thorough check up of the patient is done by the hospital authorities, it is the Institute which selects after the examination of the patient that he suffers from what malady and who is the best doctor who can attend, except when the patient or the family members desire to be treated by a particular doctor or the surgeon as the case may be. Normally, the private hospitals have a panel of doctors in various specialities and it is they who choose who is to be called. It is very difficult for the patient to give any detail that which doctor treated the patient and whether the doctor was negligent or the nursing staff was negligent. It is very difficult for such patient or his relatives to implead them as parties in the claim petition…We cannot place such a heavy burden on the patient or the family members/relatives to implead all those doctors who have treated the patient or the nursing staff to be impleaded as party. It will be a difficult task for the patient or his relatives to undertake this searching enquiry from the hospital and sometimes hospital may not co-operate. It may give such details and sometimes may not give the details...
The burden cannot be placed on the patient to implead all those treating doctors or the attending staff of the hospital as a party so as to substantiate his claim. Once a patient is admitted in a hospital it is the responsibility of the Hospital to provide the best service and if it is not, then hospital cannot take shelter under the technical ground that the concerned surgeon or the nursing staff, as the case may be, was not impleaded, therefore, the claim should be rejected on the basis of non-joinder of necessary parties
In fact, once a claim petition is filed and the claimant has successfully discharged the initial burden that the hospital was negligent, as a result of such negligence the patient died, then in that case the burden lies on the hospital and the concerned doctor who treated that patient that there was no negligence involved in the treatment. Since the burden is on the hospital, they can discharge the same by producing that doctor who treated the patient in defence to substantiate their allegation that there was no negligence. In fact, it is the hospital who engages the treating doctor thereafter it is their responsibility. The burden is greater on the Institution/ hospital than that of the claimant.”
[Extracted from Smt. Savita Garg v. The Director, National Heart Institute (2004) 8 SCC 56].
Question: 1

Negligence, as a tort, is said to have been committed when the following is/are established:

Updated On: Jan 13, 2026
  • The existence of a duty to take care, which is owed by the defendant to the complainant; and that there is a failure to attain that standard of care, as prescribed by the law, thereby, committing a breach of such duty
  • Damage, which is both causally connected with such breach and recognised by the law, has been suffered by the complainant
  • Both (A) and (B)
  • None of the above.
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The Correct Option is C

Solution and Explanation

To prove negligence, one must demonstrate a duty of care, a violation of that duty, and damages stemming directly from that violation, experienced by the person filing the complaint.
The answer is (C): Both (A) and (B)

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Question: 2

Which of the following propositions is incorrect as regards negligence?

Updated On: Jul 8, 2026
  • The test for determining medical negligence, as laid down in Bolam’s case [Bolam v Friern Hospital Management Committee, (1957) 1 WLR 582], holds good in its applicability in India.
  • The jurisprudential concept of negligence is the same in civil and criminal laws, and what may be negligence in civil law is necessarily a negligence in criminal law
  • A professional may be held liable for negligence, and the standard to be applied for judging, whether the person charged has been negligent or not, would be that of an ordinary competent person exercising ordinary skill in that profession
  • It is not possible for every professional to possess the highest level of expertise or skills in that branch which he practices; a highly skilled professional may be possessed of better qualities, but that cannot be made the basis or the yardstick for judging the performance of the professional proceeded against on indictment of negligence.
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The Correct Option is B

Solution and Explanation

The question pertains to the concept of negligence in legal terms, specifically the differences between its application in civil and criminal law. Let us analyze each proposition to determine their correctness:

  1. Proposition: "The test for determining medical negligence, as laid down in Bolam’s case [Bolam v Friern Hospital Management Committee, (1957) 1 WLR 582], holds good in its applicability in India."
    Explanation: The Bolam test is indeed applied in India to determine medical negligence. It states that a doctor is not considered negligent if they act in accordance with a practice accepted as proper by a responsible body of medical professionals skilled in that particular art. This proposition is correct.
  2. Proposition: "The jurisprudential concept of negligence is the same in civil and criminal laws, and what may be negligence in civil law is necessarily a negligence in criminal law."
    Explanation: The concept of negligence differs between civil and criminal law. In civil law, negligence usually involves compensation for loss or damage caused by the breach of a duty of care. In criminal law, negligence implies a level of recklessness or gross negligence that warrants punishment. Hence, negligence in civil law does not automatically translate to criminal negligence. This proposition is incorrect.
  3. Proposition: "A professional may be held liable for negligence, and the standard to be applied for judging, whether the person charged has been negligent or not, would be that of an ordinary competent person exercising ordinary skill in that profession."
    Explanation: This statement is correct as it aligns with the standards applied in negligence cases, where a professional is judged against the standard of an ordinary competent member of the profession under similar circumstances.
  4. Proposition: "It is not possible for every professional to possess the highest level of expertise or skills in that branch which he practices; a highly skilled professional may be possessed of better qualities, but that cannot be made the basis or the yardstick for judging the performance of the professional proceeded against on indictment of negligence."
    Explanation: This statement is correct. The judgment in negligence cases does not expect professionals to possess the highest level of expertise; rather, they are judged by the standard of reasonable competence applicable to their field.

Based on the analysis, the incorrect proposition is: "The jurisprudential concept of negligence is the same in civil and criminal laws, and what may be negligence in civil law is necessarily a negligence in criminal law." This reflects a misunderstanding of the legal principles governing negligence in different contexts.

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Question: 3

Which of the following propositions is incorrect as regards negligence?

Updated On: Jul 8, 2026
  • Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as they belong to the medical profession.
  • Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as they are governed by the National Medical Commission Act, 2019
  • Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as the Ethics and Medical Registration Board has the power to regulate professional conduct and promote medical ethics.
  • Medical practitioners, though belonging to the medical profession, are not immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence.
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The Correct Option is D

Solution and Explanation

The question concerns the legal accountability of medical practitioners for negligence. Let's evaluate each option to identify the incorrect proposition regarding negligence:

  1. Option 1: Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as they belong to the medical profession.
    • This statement suggests that merely belonging to the medical profession grants immunity against claims of negligence. This is incorrect as no profession, including the medical field, automatically provides such immunity against claims of negligence.
  2. Option 2: Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as they are governed by the National Medical Commission Act, 2019.
    • The National Medical Commission Act regulates medical education and practice but does not provide immunity from negligence claims. Hence, this is an incorrect proposition.
  3. Option 3: Medical practitioners are immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence, as the Ethics and Medical Registration Board has the power to regulate professional conduct and promote medical ethics.
    • While the Ethics and Medical Registration Board regulates professional conduct and ethics, it does not grant immunity from negligence claims. Therefore, this is also incorrect.
  4. Option 4: Medical practitioners, though belonging to the medical profession, are not immune from a claim for damages on the ground of negligence.
    • This statement accurately reflects the legal position that medical practitioners can be held liable for negligence. Hence, this is the correct proposition.

In conclusion, the only correct statement is that medical practitioners, despite their professional status, do not enjoy immunity from claims of negligence. Therefore, Option 4 is the correct answer.

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Question: 4

Which of the following is a seminal judgment on medical negligence in India?

Updated On: Jan 13, 2026
  • M.C. Mehta v. Union of India, AIR 1987 SC 1086
  • Municipal Corporation of Delhi v. Sushila Devi, AIR 1999 SC 1929
  • Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab, (2005) 6 SCC 1.
  • All the above
Show Solution

The Correct Option is C

Solution and Explanation

The Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab case is a key Indian legal precedent concerning medical professionals' accountability for negligence.
The correct choice is (C): Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab, (2005) 6 SCC 1

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Question: 5

Now, a large number of private hospitals, nursing homes and clinics have emerged. In view of the good reputation they have built, patients go there for treatment in large numbers. These hospitals provide the medical treatment to those patients through doctors employed by them or by doctors who work there on some arrangement. These hospitals raise the bills for the fees and medical treatment provided to those patients by all such doctors. In such circumstances, if the patient suffers injury due to negligence of the doctors, then:

Updated On: Jul 8, 2026
  • The hospitals would be equally liable for damages, on the principles of vicarious liability or on the principles analogous to vicarious liability, and these hospitals cannot shove off their responsibility and liability to pay compensation for the damages suffered by the patients due to the negligence of the doctors provided by these very hospitals
  • The hospitals would not at all be held liable for damages.
  • The hospitals would not at all be held liable for damages; but the doctors could not shove off their liability for negligence.
  • Neither the hospitals nor the doctors are held liable, as no one can guarantee the desired result in the medical profession.
Show Solution

The Correct Option is A

Solution and Explanation

The question is about the legal responsibility of private hospitals for potential damages arising from the negligence of their doctors. The options provided explore various levels of liability for hospitals and doctors.

Let's analyze the options and find the correct answer through logical reasoning based on the principles of vicarious liability as supported by the case of Smt. Savita Garg v. The Director, National Heart Institute.

  1. Option 1: The hospitals would be equally liable for damages, on the principles of vicarious liability or on the principles analogous to vicarious liability, and these hospitals cannot shove off their responsibility and liability to pay compensation for the damages suffered by the patients due to the negligence of the doctors provided by these very hospitals.
  2. Option 2: The hospitals would not at all be held liable for damages.
  3. Option 3: The hospitals would not at all be held liable for damages; but the doctors could not shove off their liability for negligence.
  4. Option 4: Neither the hospitals nor the doctors are held liable, as no one can guarantee the desired result in the medical profession.

Explanation:

According to the doctrine of vicarious liability, an employer is held responsible for the actions of its employees, conducted during the course of their employment. In a healthcare setup, a hospital employs doctors to provide treatment; therefore, the hospital may be held accountable for negligence by one of its doctors.

The case mentioned (Smt. Savita Garg v. The Director, National Heart Institute) reinforces this concept by stating that hospitals hold a duty of care to ensure that patients are treated properly and safely, and if a patient suffers from negligence, the hospital cannot evade responsibility by separating itself from the actions of its doctors.

Furthermore, the case judgment explained that it is unreasonable to expect patients to identify and sue specific negligent doctors due to the difficulty in obtaining detailed internal hospital information about specific medical actions or staff involved. The burden of proof shifts to the hospitals once an initial claim is made.

Hence, based on this explanation, the correct answer is:

Correct Answer: Option 1 - The hospitals would be equally liable for damages, on the principles of vicarious liability or on the principles analogous to vicarious liability, and these hospitals cannot shove off their responsibility and liability to pay compensation for the damages suffered by the patients due to the negligence of the doctors provided by these very hospitals.

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Top Questions on Law of Torts

Questions Asked in CLAT PG exam

An unpleasant tussle ensured between the TATA Sons and Cyrus Pallonji Mistry (“CPM”) in October 2016, when Mistry, who was the sixth chairman of Tata Sons, was ousted from the position of Executive Chairman of Tata Sons Limited. CPM took over as the chairman in 2012 after Ratan Tata announced his retirement. Tata Group patriarch Ratan Tata had personally asked Cyrus Mistry to resign as chairman of Tata Sons as the board had lost faith in him, but his refusal led to the removal via majority vote. Cyrus Investments Private limited and Sterling Investment Corporation Private Limited belonged to the Shapoorji Palloni Group in which CPM held a controlling interest (about 2% of the issued share capital of Tata Sons). Seven out of the nine directors of Tata Sons voted for CPM’s replacement after Farida Khambata abstained and Mistry was declared ineligible to vote as he was an interested director. Mistry challenged his removal, accusing the board of mismanagement and of oppressing minority shareholders. however, the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) rejected his petition. After this Mistry challenged his removal in National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT). In 2018, NCLAT order restored Mistry as the group’s executive chairman. Tata Sons challenged that NCLAT order in Supreme Court. CPM also challenged the order for few more relief. Supreme Court stayed NCLAT’s order reinstating Cyrus Mistry as the executive chairman of Tata Sons and restoring his directorships in the holding company as well as three group companies, with a preliminary observation that the first impression of the order was “not good” and that the tribunal ‘could’ not have given consequential relief that had not been sought in the first place. Ultimately, the Supreme Court decided the case in favour of Tata Sons. One of the issues decided by Supreme Court was that “whether the case was fit to be qualified as a situation of ‘Oppression and Mismanagement’ under Section 241 of the Companies Act, 2013?”. On this issue, the Supreme Court observed that “unless the removal of a person as a chairman of a company is oppressive or mismanaged or done in a prejudicial manner damaging the interests of the company, its members or the public at large, the NCLT cannot interfere with the removal of a person as a Chairman of a Company in a petition under Section 241 of the Companies Act, 2013.” This case highlighted the point that “an executive chairman does not have sovereign authority over the company. In corporate democracy, decision making always remains with the Board as long as they enjoy the pleasure of the shareholders. Likewise, an executive chairman will continue as long as he/she enjoys the pleasure of the Board. An assumption by the executive chairman that he/she would have a free hand in running the affairs of the company is incongruous to corporate governance and corporate democracy. The Tribunal held that the concept of ‘free hand rule’ is antithesis to collective responsibility and collective decision making”.
[Based on Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. v. Cyrus Investment Pvt. Ltd., 2021 SCC 122].
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Alastair Hudson in his book ‘Securities Law’ First Edition (Sweet & Maxwell), 2008 at page 342, refers to ‘Restricted Offers’ and noticed that there is no contravention of Section 85 of FSMA 2000, if: “(b) the offer is made to or directed at fewer than 100 persons, other than qualified investors, per EEA State”. The purpose underlying that exemption, the author says, is mainly the fact that the offer is not being made to an appreciable section of “the public” such that the policy of the prospectus rules generally is not affected. Further, the author says that “Self-evidently, while an offer to 99 ordinary members of the public would be within the literal terms of the exemption, it would not be the sort of activity anticipated by the legislation. Moreover, if a marketing campaign were arranged such that ordinary members of the people were approached in groups of 99 people at a time in an effort to avoid the prospectus rules, then that would not appear to be within the spirit of the regulations and might be held to contravene the core principle that a regulated person must act with integrity.”
I may, therefore, indicate, subject to what has been stated above, in India that any share or debenture issue beyond forty-nine persons, would be a public issue attracting all the relevant provisions of the SEBI Act, regulations framed thereunder, the Companies Act, pertaining to the public issue. Facts clearly reveal that Saharas have issued securities to the public more than the threshold limit statutorily fixed under the first proviso to Section 67(3) and hence violated the listing provisions which may attract civil and criminal liabilities. Principles of listing, which I may later on discuss, is intended to assist public companies in identifying their obligations and responsibilities, which are continuing in nature, transparent in content and call for high degree of integrity. Obligations are imposed on the issuer on an ongoing basis. Public companies who are legally obliged to list their securities are deemed to accept the continuing obligations, by virtue of their application, prospectus and the subsequent maintenance of listing on a recognized stock exchange. Disclosure is the rule, there is no exception. Misleading public is a serious crime, which may attract civil and criminal liability. Listing of securities depends not upon one’s volition, but on statutory mandate.
[Extract from Sahara India Real Estate Corporation Limited v. Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Para 89-91, Civil Appeal No. 9833/2011 (SC)]
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The aim of the rules of natural justice is to secure justice or to put it negatively to prevent miscarriage of justice. These rules can operate only in areas not covered by any law validly made. In other words, they do not supplant the law of the land but supplement it. The concept of natural justice has undergone a great deal of change in recent years. In the past, it was thought that it included just two rules namely: (1) no one shall be a judge in his own case (Nemo debet esse judex propria causa) and (2) no decision shall be given against a party without affording him a reasonable hearing (audi alteram partem).
Very soon thereafter a third rule was envisaged and that is that quasi-judicial enquiries must be held in good faith, without bias and not arbitrarily or unreasonably. But in the course of years many more subsidiary rules came to be added to the rules of natural justice. Till very recently it was the opinion of the courts that unless the authority concerned was required by the law under which it functioned to act judicially there was no room for the application of the rules of natural justice. The validity of that limitation is not questioned.
If the purpose of the rules of natural justice is to prevent miscarriage of justice one fails to see why those rules should be made inapplicable to administrative enquiries. Often times it is not easy to draw the line that demarcates administrative enquiries from quasi-judicial enquiries. Enquiries which were considered administrative at one time are now being considered as quasi-judicial in character. Arriving at a just decision is the aim of both quasi-judicial enquiries as well as administrative enquiries. An unjust decision in an administrative enquiry may have more far reaching effect than a decision in a quasi-judicial enquiry as observed by this Court in Suresh Koshy George v. University of Kerala [Civil Appeal No. 990/68, decided on 15-07- 1968], the rules of natural justice are not embodied rules. What particular rule of natural justice should apply to a given case must depend to a great extent on the facts and circumstances of that case, the framework of the law under which the enquiry is held and the constitution of the Tribunal or body of persons appointed for that purpose. Whenever a complaint is made before a court that some principle of natural justice had been contravened the court has to decide whether the observance of that rule was necessary for a just decision on the facts of that case.
[Extract from the judgment of the Supreme Court in A.K. Kraipak v. Union of India, (1969) 2 SCC 262, decided on April 29, 1969, hereafter ‘A.K. Kraipak’].
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The doctrine of promissory estoppel is by now well recognized and well defined by a catena of decisions of this Court. Where the Government makes a promise knowing or intending that it would be acted on by the promise and, in fact, the promise, acting in reliance on it, alters his position, the Government would be held bound by the promise and the promise would be enforceable against the Government at the instance of the promise notwithstanding that there is no consideration for the promise and the promise is not recorded in the form of a formal contract as required by Article 229 of the Constitution. The rule of promissory estoppel being an equitable doctrine has to be moulded to suit the particular situation. It is not a hard-and-fast rule but an elastic one, the objective of which is to do justice between the parties and to extend an equitable treatment to them. This doctrine is a principle evolved by equity, to avoid injustice and though commonly named promissory estoppel, it is neither in the realm of contract nor in the realm of estoppel. For application of the doctrine of promissory estoppel the promise must establish that he suffered in detriment or altered his position by reliance on the promise.
Normally, the doctrine of promissory estoppel is being applied against the Government and defence based on executive necessity would not be accepted by the court. However, if it can be shown by the Government that having regard to the facts as they have subsequently transpired, it would be inequitable to hold the Government to the promise made by it, the court would not raise an equity in favour of the promise and enforce the promise against the Government. Where public interest warrants, the principles of promissory estoppel cannot be invoked. The Government can change the policy in public interest. However, it is well settled that taking cue from this doctrine, the authority cannot be compelled to do something which is not allowed by law or prohibited by law. There is no promissory estoppel against the settled proposition of law. Doctrine of promissory estoppel cannot be invoked for enforcement of a promise made contrary to law, because none can be compelled to act against the statute. Thus, the Government or public authority cannot be compelled to make a provision which is contrary to law.
[Extract from the judgment of the Supreme Court in Shree Sidhbali Steels Limited v. State of Uttar Pradesh, (2011) 3 SCC 193, decided on January 20, 2011, hereafter ‘Shree Sidhbali Steels’].
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