Bandra acid attack victim loses battle

Acid attack victim Preeti Rathi, 23, breathed her last on Saturday at 4pm, a couple of weeks after an unknown man flung acid on her at Bandra Terminus.

Rathi’s family has refused to claim the body of their daughter unless justice is done by the state.

“We do not trust the railway police’s line of investigation. We are appealing that the probe be shifted to CBI. What happened to our daughter should not happen to anyone else’s daughter. The attacker has to be arrested,” said Preeti’s father Amarsingh Rathi. The deceased’s mother Roshni Rathi was inconsolable. She repeatedly asked whether Preeti’s attacker would be caught.
Rathi’s family and other acid attack victims from Stop Acid Attacks, a nationwide campaign for stronger laws on acid attacks, are going to meet the home minister on Sunday.   

Preeti’s condition had been deteriorating since Saturday morning, said doctors at Bombay Hospital. She died of multi-organ failure and an eventual cardio respiratory arrest. “Her lungs stopped functioning gradually. Her trachea, vocal cord, food pipe and lungs had been reduced to a lump of soft burnt mass. Since Friday, her kidneys had stopped functioning. At 3pm Saturday, she started breathing irregularly. At 4pm, her heart stopped beating,” said Dr Ashok Gupta, plastic surgeon at Bombay Hospital.

Inspite of desperate attempts to resuscitate Rathi, she could not be revived. “Her blood pressure levels and haemoglobin levels had stooped dangerously low. Her lungs were unable to purify oxygen and she had to be put on an extra-corporeal machine to help purify her blood,” said Dr Sagar Sakle, officer on special duty at Bombay Hospital.

“Since the day she was admitted to Bombay Hospital on May 19, she had stopped communicating with her family or the doctors,” said Dr Gupta. She had undergone bronchosopy tests twice to ascertain the damage to her wind and food pipes.

Rathi had also suffered from a complete collapse of the right lung and a partial left lung collapse.

Doctors were contemplating surgically removing the affected part of the lungs if her condition stabilised.  “Her condition was deteriorating by the day, so we were focused on reviving her and thus were unable to conduct any surgeries,” said Dr Sakle.

Rathi, a nursing graduate at Delhi had come to Mumbai after bagging a job in the Army Medical College at Colaba as a nurse lieutenant. She was attacked by an unknown person after she alighted from Garib Rath Express on May 2 at Bandra Terminus. The deceased had swallowed acid which had been flung at her and had suffered from burn injuries in her lungs.

Rathi’s body has been transferred to  JJ Hospital for a post-mortem but the family has refused to sign the consent form. They have also decided not to fly back the body to New Delhi immediately.

National Commission for Women member Nirmala Prabhwalkar met Preeti’s father at Bombay Hospital.

Timeline
May 2: Delhi resident Preeti Rathi is attacked at Bandra terminus. She had come to Mumbai to join INHS Asvini hospital in Colaba as a lieutenant nurse. She is first taken to Gurunanak hospital in Bandra and later shifted to Masina hospital in Byculla. She sustains 12-15% burns on her face, neck, arms and deep internal injuries in throat region as she swallowed the acid. Doctors put her on feeding tube passing through nose. A week later at Masina hospital doctors treat her for chest infection.

May 18: After her condition stabilises, doctors perform gastroscopy. Later in the evening, she is transferred to Bombay Hospital as she requires specialised doctors.

May 19: A CT scan and bronchoscopy is performed. She undergoes a minor surgery to introduce a feeding tube in stomach. Her chest infection persists.

May 22: Bombay Hospital doctors inform the media that her right lung has collapsed due to chemical pneumonitis and her left lung is being ventilated.

May 25: Doctors close the hole in her wind pipe using glue.

May 31: Her kidney stops functioning.

June 1: She dies of multiorgan failure and cardio respiratory arrest.

Innocent or guilty?
After the death of the acid attack victim, Preeti Rathi, the railway police will be booking the accused Pawan Gehlaun (24) for murder. Earlier, Gehlaun had been booked in an attempt-to-murder case.

“We would be preparing an inquest panchnama of the body after which it will be handed over to her family,” a railway crime branch officer said. Gehlaun is in judicial custody. He was arrested after the victim told the police that she had spotted him at Delhi railway station before boarding the train. The police had also arrested another suspect, Satyam, who was released when CCTV footage confirmed that he was at work on the day of the incident. The railway police do not have much evidence against Gehlaun who has refused to undergo a lie-detector test. The victim’s father had filed an affidavit in the court stating that Gehlaun was not the attacker. However, with Preeti’s death, the police who were banking on her to identify whether Gehlaun was her attacker, it would be hard for them to prove their case against him.

A costly affair
Western Railway’s divisional manager for Mumbai Sandeep Silas said that the railways had been bearing the expenses and would have done it till she was cured. When asked that would railways bear the cost of air-lifting the body as demanded by Preeti’s father, Silas said that they would not be able to do so as there is no provision to get such funds approved. “The hospital where she was going to join as a nurse could take up the matter,” he told dna.