NEW DELHI: Al-Hind hospital, a 15-bedded nursing home run by a single MBBS doctor-in a narrow, dingy lane in old Mustafabad area of north-east Delhi, has seen so many patients in last three days which it had never received even in a month.
Of the 500-odd patients — almost all of them Muslims — it received since communal violence erupted in the area, about 50-60 who received stab wounds, bullet and pellet injuries and brutal assaults were serious enough to need prompt medical intervention at bigger facilities.
But they could be shifted only after 1 am on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday after a Delhi High Court bench, in an unprecedented midnight hearing at the residence of a judge, ordered the immediate evacuation of the injured from the nursing home.
The order came on a petition filed late Tuesday night by a forum comprising activists and doctors from various government and private hospitals, seeking police protection for ambulances heading towards medical facilities with those injured.
Those who were evacuated to government facilities like Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital and Lok Naik Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital included a young man who had been partly torn apart and received 92 stitches in his private parts, the mufti of a mosque with broken hands, legs and ribcage and a man who was stabbed nearly 30 times.
“I had to appeal to doctors I knew for the evacuation of the patients because I was witnessing the condition of many patients deteriorating fast and the murderous mobs in the area were not letting ambulances come near our hospital,” Dr Ali Anwar, proprietor of the nursing home, told this newspaper.
He runs the hospital with two other ‘physicians’ with BDS degrees and few technicians. The centre usually gets 20-25 patients in OPD every day while the bed-occupancy is just two-three.
So it was a dramatic transformation for the tiny hospital that was suddenly overwhelmed with a rush of patients — shot, stabbed, profusely bleeding and in need of intensive medical care.
For hours that Dr Anwar was left to deal with several injured patients and fast depleting supply of basics such as painkillers, sutures and antibiotics, he had no choice but to ask 7-8 quacks in the area to serve the patients with him.
“What we have seen in past several hours is not something we ever imagined was possible in the national capital,” he said.
By Wednesday afternoon, most of the patients had either been referred to bigger facilities or discharged but Dr Anwar and his younger brother Miraj Ekram, a dentist, are yet to experience a moment of rest. Mohd Uwais, 22, who received a stray bullet near his shoulder, said: “I am born here-had never seen this ugly side of the city.”
‘Brutal cops’
Dr Miraj Ekram put a patient with a severe head injury and haemorrhagic shock onto a stretcher and ran with him for a km till the main road to find an ambulance.
While cops allowed him to be taken to GTB Hospital, 3-4 others injured to put up in auto were beaten.
HATE SPEECHES INVITE COURT IRE
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Later he tweeted urging people to “prevent another Shaheen Bagh” at Jaffrabad.
ANURAG THAKUR JAN 27
At an election rally in Rithala, the Union Minister of State for Finance was seen chanting “desh ke gaddaron ko”, to which the crowd responded “goli maaro sa*** ko”. He was barred from campaigning for 72 hours by the Election Commission, but the slogan summed up BJP’s poll plank in Delhi.
PARVESH VERMA JAN 28
“...Lakhs of people gather there (Shaheen Bagh). People of Delhi will have to think and take a decision. They’ll enter your houses, rape your sisters and daughters, kill them… This is what they did in Kashmir… Modi ji & Amit Shah won’t come to save you tomorrow...” the Delhi MP said in an interview.
ABHAY VERMA FEB 25
The BJP MLA from Laxmi Nagar in east Delhi led a march where people raised the slogan “Police ke hatyaaron ko, goli maaro saalon ko” (Shoot the cop killers).
The group was also heard chanting “Jo Hindu hit ki baat karega, wohi desh pe raj karega’ (Only those who talk about Hindus will rule in India)