BHUBANESWAR: The viral story of Helaram Mallik, a resident of West Bengal who reportedly travelled 230 km to Bahanaga and found his 23-year-old son Biswajit lying in the midst of dead bodies at the temporary morgue there has emerged as fake.
This was flagged by Balasore collector Dattatraya Bhausaheb Shinde on Wednesday who warned against such “fake news” that is having a demoralising effect on frontline workers.
The news report was first published by a reputed media house on June 5 and subsequently republished by several other national and international media. As per the report, Helaram refused to believe Biswajit had died in the mishap and travelled from Howrah to the spot in an ambulance to search for him. He traced Biswajit amid dead bodies at the temporary morgue set up at Bahanaga high school but reportedly found him alive. He then resuscitated him at Balasore Hospital and took him back to a hospital in Kolkata.
The Balasore district administration verified the authenticity of the story and found it to be entirely fake. “While most of the media houses were quite cooperative, some have tried to demean the relief efforts by publishing the fake news of a father rescuing a son presumed dead. Our senior officer has spoken to the father and he has clarified it was fake news,” the collector informed on Twitter.
Stating the referral slip of Bhadrak Hospital provided to him clearly confirms that the patient received adequate care and was never presumed dead, the collector warned such immoral attempts to demean frontline workers and people of Balasore will not be tolerated.
Superintendent of Fakir Mohan MCH informed Biswajit was first carried by ambulance to Basudevpur CHC and then referred to Bhadrak DHH on June 2. The next day, Biswajit contacted Helaram who himself took the former to a private hospital in Kolkata despite him being referred to SCB MCH at Cuttack.