Bhubaneswar, Aug. 6: The former chairman of Bhapur block in Nayagarh district, Basant Kumar Sahu, 74, who was admitted at a private hospital here for prostate surgery, died early this morning after falling from the third floor of the building.

The incident sparked tension on the hospital premises with the family members of the deceased alleging negligence by the authorities. Basant, who was admitted at the hospital four days ago, was to be discharged today.

Instead of opening the toilet’s door, the deceased, who belonged to Fatehgarh, had opened another door, which opens to the sewerage and other pipelines. The door, meant for the maintenance staff members, was not locked. As Basant stepped out, he fell from the third floor. Though he had been rushed to the ICU, he died within a few minutes.

Basant’s wife Kamalakanti and daughter were at the hospital. “When the duo had just dozed off, he went to toilet around 4.30am. Instead of opening the toilet door, Basant opened the side service door,” said the deceased’s relative Priya Ranjan Sahu.

Angry family members of Sahu demanded action against the authorities and alleged that the hospital security guards had misbehaved with them.

Nayapalli police rushed to the hospital and convinced Sahu’s family members to lodge a formal complaint with them for action against the guilty. Sahu’s son Santosh Kumar Sahu lodged a complaint with Nayapalli police against the hospital authorities of negligence, which caused death to his father.

Santosh said the hospital authorities had not locked the side service door adjacent to the toilet.

The hospital authorities, however, said the victim was roaming in the corridor of the general ward on third floor around 4.15am and he was advised several times to go to bed. Even his attendants were asked to take him to bed. “However, when the attendants dozed off, the patient mistakenly opened the door of the duct room and fell in it. He died of cardiac arrest,” said managing director of the hospital S.N. Pati.

“We have got a complaint from the deceased’s family and are looking into the matter. We have registered an unnatural death case and conducted the inquest of the body. We will register the case under Section 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the Indian Penal Code after the inquiry is over,” said inspector in charge of Nayapalli police station Anup Kanungo.

The relatives of other patients alleged that around 15 days ago another patient also had fallen into that room, but had a lucky escape for which the matter could not come to the public notice. “The hospital staff members seemed not to have learnt any lesson from that incident,” said a patient’s relative.

However, the hospital authorities dismissed such allegations, saying that this was the first time such incident happened. “Now, we are keeping it locked,” said Pati.