dna follow-up: Help pouring in for cancer-stricken poet

Following a report published by dna in its edition dated September 22, 2013, several citizens have come forward offering financial assistance to ailing Dalit writer Namdeo Dhasal.

Dhasal is suffering from colorectal cancer and is undergoing treatment at Bombay Hospital, which is estimated to cost Rs10 lakh. After the report in dna, the 63-year-old Marathi writer’s well-wishers have contributed Rs6 lakh.

State rural development minister Jayant Patil and NCP MLA Jitendra Awhad contributed Rs5 lakh and Rs1 lakh respectively. More help is in the pipeline.

Dhasal was one of the founders of the militant Dalit Panther movement, which emerged out of the casteist riots in Worli’s BDD chawls in the late 1960s. He is also a pioneer of the Dalit literature movement known for its deep concern for the underprivileged.

Patil told dna on Tuesday that he had great respect for Dhasal and his literary work. “He had founded the Dalit Panther on the line of the Black Panther movement in the US.

Dhasal is a great poet and writer who mesmerised the readers by his writing style. When I read the dna report, I thought I should do something to help him,” he said.

Awhad said he was impressed with Dhasal’s commitment to the underprivileged. “It is sad that a great poet and writer like Dhasal is facing these problems,” he said.

The Padma Shri award winner has a medical history of myasthenia gravis, one of the lesser-known auto-immune diseases. The hallmark of this disease is muscle weakness.

Muscles that control eye and eyelid movement, facial expression, chewing, talking and swallowing are particularly susceptible. The muscles that control breathing, neck and limb movements can also be affected.