Treatment given to J Jayalalithaa at Apollo Hospital was correct: SC-appointed AIIMS panel

The hospital group had moved the apex court because it believed that the inquiry commission was acting in a “biased” manner, and conducting a medical fact-finding exercise which was beyond its jurisdiction and expertise.

Hearing the plea, in December last year, the Supreme Court had held that it was only “just and proper” to constitute a medical board to aid the one-man inquiry commission.

Details of AIIMS medical board report

The AIIMS panel heard statements of the witnesses called by various parties, went through all the documents made available to the inquiry commission, and reviewed all the medical reports, including recordings of radiological investigations and echocardiograms, before it came to its conclusion.

In its report, the medical board has given the sequence of events, as ascertained by it, starting with the medical conditions suffered by Jayalalithaa prior to her admission to Apollo Hospitals in September 2016, and also mentioned the treatment she was receiving over the years.

On her admission to Apollo Hospitals on 22 September, 2016, the panel noted that an “ambulance was called to the former chief minister’s residence around 10 pm”, which found Jayalalithaa in “altered sensorium” with “48% saturation”.

The AIIMS medical board then went on to list out the medical investigations and treatment given to the former chief minister in the days after her admission.

On 4 December, 2016, Jayalalithaa suffered a “cardiac arrest, which was followed by CPR and ECMO insertion”. The ECMO was maintained for 24 hours, the AIIMS panel stated.

A day later, on 5 December, Jayalalithaa was “declared dead by as per correct medical protocol with Apollo team and doctors from AIIMS examining and finding no brain or heart activity”. Her death was declared at 11:30 pm on the same day.

The medical panel also agreed with the final diagnosis, which was: “Bacteremia and septic shock with respiratory infection.” It also agreed with the other diagnoses.

Status of the Inquiry Commission

The Tamil Nadu government granted a final extension to the Justice Arumughswamy Commission of Inquiry till August 24 to submit its final report. The term of the commission has been extended over 10 times over the years.

Though the report was to be submitted on August 3, the government granted the extension in view of the request made by the commission that it was awaiting the report of the SC-appointed AIIMS medical board to complete the final report.

After Jayalalithaa’s death, conspiracy theories were floated by many suggesting that the former chief minister had died of unnatural causes, and that there was a lot of mystery behind her death.

At that point, former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister O Panneselvam too had expressed doubts about his party supremo’s death, and tried to imply that VK Sasikala, a close associate of Jayalalithaa, had something to do with it.

It was on his insistence that the inquiry commission was set up by former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswamy. It was one of the demands OPS had put forward to merge his faction with EPS’ camp.

When OPS was called to testify in front of the inquiry commission, he did a massive U-turn and gave a clean chit to VK Sasikala.