Train crushes city doc, kills his life-saving mission in its tracks

Dr Pankaj Shah (54), an Ahmedabad physician beloved by his patients, was so engrossed in a cell-phone conversation about the wellbeing of one of them that he never saw the train that crushed his head mid-sentence. Shah was smashed down by the Ahmedabad-Botad train, not far from his hospital, while he was crossing the railway track near the Shreyas bridge, on Tuesday. His lifeless, mutilated the body was dragged over some 25 metres.

Neeta Patel, a nurse who works at Shah’s Navkar hospital, said that the doctor had parked his car at one end of the track and was crossing over when he received a call.
Bharatbhai, an auto-rickshaw driver who witnessed the accident, said that he had seen Shah talking to someone on his cell-phone. Sometime during the conversation, Shah’s spectacles fell onto to the tracks and the train ran over him while he was trying to retrieve the spectacles.

According to Patel, Shah made his way home at around 5 pm from his other clinic at Lal darwaja. His wife, Dr Dharmista Shah, a gynaecologist, was with him at that time. Shah decided to visit his hospital after dropping his wife at their bungalow near Jivraj crossing because he had received a call that two of his patients were in a serious condition. Shah is survived by his wife and two sons Harsh (an eye surgeon) and Chinmay (a radiologist).  Additional reporting: Ritesh Shah