Teenager surgeon and patient go into hiding

Even as the Medical Council of India (MCI) and the district administration are tightening their noose around Dr K Murugesan, who made his 15-year-old son Dhileepan Raj perform a caesarean section in a clinic in Manaparai near Tiruchi recently, the teenager and the woman who went under the scalpel have gone missing.

It is said that the doctor has taken Neela (20), who delivered a male baby through the controversial caesarean last month, into his “protective custody”. Murugesan had earlier claimed that Neela is his relative. Murugesan, a general surgeon, and his wife M Gandhimathi, a general physician, had allowed their son to wield the scalpel to get his name in the Guinness Book of World records, doctors who witnessed a screening of the surgery said.

Neela was living with her husband Ganesan at Chinnakulathupatti near Manaparai to where she returned with the baby after the delivery. “They were here till Wednesday. Murugesan, who is related to Neela, is sheltering her,” a neighbour said.