The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the centre to frame a policy for rehabilitating patients who have been cured after treatment at mental hospitals across the country.

A bench of Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul asked the Centre to frame such policy after PIL petitioner Advocate Gaurav Kumar Bansal sought the court's intervention for the rehabilitation of people declared fit after treatment. Seeking the discharge of these cured people, Bansal in his PIL has said that they are living in pathetic conditions with mentally ill patients. The petitioner has also sought framing of guidelines for the relief and rehabilitation of the patients who have become normal. The petitioner advocate has referred to his interaction with those who have been cured at a Bareilly hospital.

In his PIL, Bansal says: "What was disturbing was that along with mentally sick patients, the patients who are absolutely normal and fit to be discharged are also living." He said some of the women, whose mental health has been restored now, are in the Bareilly hospital since 1982, 1984 and the 1990s.