The Supreme Court on Tuesday slapped a penalty of Rs 70 lakh each on two doctors from a Gurugram hospital for deliberately giving shelter to a politician accused of murder. The ruling came after an investigation revealed that Balbir Singh, a former legislator of the Indian National Lok Dal, had been admitted to the hospital only to evade arrest.

This is the first time the top court has taken action against the practice of strategic hospital admission by feigning illness, according to Mail Today.

Dr Munish Prabhakar and Dr KS Sachdev were convicted of obstructing justice and providing shelter to the accused in December last year. While Prabhakar is the medical director at Privat Hospital, Sachdev holds the managing director’s post at the healthcare facility. The court will take up that matter again on July 6 to decide how to utilise the money for the poor, NDTV reported.

Singh was admitted to Privat Hospital after the top court rejected his bail plea on October 24, 2013, and asked him to surrender. He supposedly received treatment for heart-related ailments and was discharged after around 17 months on May 1, 2015.

After an inquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation revealed that Singh was not suffering from any disease, the bench accused the hospital of protecting the murder accused and sought an explanation. The investigation had also found that the politician had neither paid for his 527-day stay at the hospital, nor had he got a single test done, reported The Economic Times.

Singh was accused of killing one individual and injuring eight others when he opened fire at a grain market in Rohtak, Haryana, in May 2013. He had managed to stay at the hospital despite trial courts issuing five non-bailable warrants against him.