‘Where’s the hospital, Sonia?’

Malegaon: It was a promise that came back to haunt Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh. In 2001 when communal riots broke out in Malegaon, Sonia and Deshmukh had visited the town and promised to build a 200-bed hospital.

Angry family members of the blast victims at the Wadia Municipal Hospital and the privately run Faran Hospital cornered both on Saturday when they came to visit the injured.

“Where’s the hospital you had promised?”  the family members asked Deshmukh.

Turning toward Sonia, they asked: “When is your chief minister going keep his promise of building a hospital in Malegaon?” Both Sonia and Deshmukh were left searching for answers.

In the Faran Hospital, Dr Ansari, Shafiq Ahmed and Shakeel Ahmed, family members of the dead, returned the compensation cheques of Rs100,000 each to Sonia promptly saying they needed a hospital and not “this kind of help”.  

After Sonia left, apparently unable to stomach the anger, a lonely Deshmukh was left fending off the angry relatives.

The lack of a well-equipped hospital has been a big issue in Malegaon for several years now. The Wadia Municipal Hospital is ill-equipped to deal with even simple emergencies, with needles, medical cotton bandages and stitches in short supply. Faced with a severe medical crunch, several victims have been shifted to Nashik and Dhule for treatment.

Congress sources told DNA that Sonia Gandhi has taken this issue “very seriously’ and asked her political adviser Ahmed Patel to “independently” brief her on this issue. Sensing trouble, Vilasrao Deshmukh was heard telling his ministers and party workers to ensure that that the foundation stone for the hospital was laid within a month.

Deputy Chief Minister R R Patil said, “Lack of a hospital in a town of nearly 900, is not acceptable. I will use all the strength that I have and get this hospital built at the earliest.”

One doctor, 100 patients

General Surgeon Dr. Farhani Syed Ahmad runs the Faran Hospital, which has the capacity to handle 60 patients. On Friday, he was treating some 100 victims single-handedly, operating on dozens of them to take out splinters and sew up gaping wounds.

“The government hospital is like hell. There are no doctors, no medicine, nothing,” said Osman Abdullah Khan, whose brother Obeidullah, 13, received serious wounds on his legs and abdomen.

“My brother would not have survived if we had not brought him here and doctor Farhani hadn’t operated on him instantly.”

The frugal but clean two-storey hospital is just a few miles from the state-run hospital, where only about 10 of the wounded remain. Most of the rest are under surgeon Farhani’s care and in another hospital in Nashik and Dhule.

The middle-aged, soft-spoken surgeon rushed to his hospital when he heard of the blasts despite being ill himself. “We have around 100 people here, many of them critical,” Farhani said, coming out of his small operation theatre after removing splinters from the body of a young man.

“A single doctor is doing what the whole government machinery has not been able to do,” said Azhar Ahmad Mohammed, whose cousin lay in a semi-conscious state after surgery to remove splinters from his neck and chest. But the doctor is untouched by the praise.

“I’m just doing my duty to the best of my ability,” he said, as he waited for more patients to be wheeled into the tiny operation theatre. “We have lost five people despite our best efforts to save them.”

(With inputs from Reuters)