CHENNAI: Around 9 pm on October 4, a gang of armed men raided a TASMAC shop near Oragadam and shot and stabbed two of its salesmen, killing one. Only after six days was the bullet lodged inside the injured employee removed as doctors had to focus on his stab wounds. TNIE caught up with the convalescing staff, 43-year-old Ramu, who recalled the dreadful night and expressed fear for his life as the culprits are still at large, two weeks into the incident.
The night
The attack took place when Ramu was unlocking his two-wheeler and his 40-year-old colleague Thulasidass was about to lock the shop’s back door. They had already pulled down the front shutter and locked it.
“No sooner had I turned towards Thulasidass hearing his cry than one gang member stabbed me in the abdomen. One by one, three men started thrusting their knives at me. As I bolted for the compound wall, one stabbed me on the shoulder. Seconds later, I heard a report and felt a pain on my back,” Ramu recalled.
He first took it for the explosion of a country bomb and the pain, shrapnel piercing his back. As he climbed the compound wall, he heard another report, which, in hindsight, he realises was the gunshot that killed Thulasidass.
Ramu hid in thickets by a lake, clutching his abdominal wound. About 30 minutes later, he ran towards the road, where, as luck would have it, his former colleague was passing by on a motorcycle. “It would have been me who died that night; I was the one who usually opened the door since Thulasidass was physically challenged. That night he volunteered to do so, saying it was already late. I faintly remember the gang asking for cash counters and Thulasidass saying something,” Ramu said. He was initially taken to government Chengalpattu hospital, where he was treated for his stab wounds.
Dr J Muthukumaran, Dean of the GH, said: “A scan showed what appeared to be a metal object lodged inside his body. But we were focused on treating the wound on his abdomen and shoulder. Since we lacked cardiothoracic surgeons, we could not risk any blood vessel getting damaged while removing the object.”
It was only on October 10, when Ramu was admitted to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital (RGGGH) that the metal piece was identified as a bullet. By then, six days had elapsed. Muthukumaran said incidents of people surviving with metal objects lodged inside their bodies are common. “Only in extreme conditions does it become necessary to remove the bullet. When Ramu was physically fit for a transfer, we sent him to the RGGGH, where the bullet was removed,” he added.
Ramu was discharged from the hospital on Monday, but he lives in fear that the robbers might come back for him for speaking to the police.
Accused at large
D Dhanasekaran, Secretary of TASMAC Union, claimed the investigating officer covered up the possibility of gun fire even after Ramu explained to them about it. “It was when the doctors found a bullet inside Ramu’s body that police disclosed that Thulasidass, too, was shot,” he said.
M Sathiyapriya, Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG - Kancheepuram Range) told TNIE that a special team has been formed to arrest the culprits. Police sources said migrant labourers in and around Oragadam area, where the robbery took place, were being interrogated by the special police team.