I met an accident on 18th July, 2006. It was a rainy day, after some heavy showers in early morning, it slowed down for a while and I decided to leave my home at around 10:30 AM. Due to heavy rains everything was chocked, from drains to traffic. After driving for a while in 2nd and 3rd gear, finally I managed to reach India Gate, I decided to go to Teen Murti and then to Dandi Yatra Murti.
Although it was raining slowly, nice breeze was all over and I was really enjoying my ride(as I always do), listening Radio(Mirchi). As far as my speed was concerned, it was something in between 50-55 Kmph. Everything was awesome,.......................
Suddenly, a blue line bus ahead of me driving in left lost its balance, and turned towards right,..........and that was it, all of a sudden I tried to put my brakes on but, due to wet road and slppery conditions my bike started skidding and then, .................a bang!
Fortunately, I went off the bike on the other side and my bike gone under the bus. Everything was at standstill for a moment and then, the bus driver came out explaining that he lost the balance.......and blah.......blah. I was still recoverying from this, trying to stand up, I realized that I've injured my right shoulder, but somehow I managed to wakeup and came in front of the bus. Some people came out of the bus and put my bike aside, I said to the driver that get aside I'm calling the PCR(Police Control Room), they said ok, but they flew off afterwards. Till this time I managed to note down the bus number : DL 1P A 7825, route number : 729.
I was alone on the side of the road with my damaged bike without any help and first aid, I tried to locate some help and fortunately found a PCR on the other side of the road. I with my injured shoulder and hip, tried to cross the road, and finally reported the whole incident to the Policemen there. They broadcasted the incident on the wireless and said “Apni bike side me laga ke aaja” (take ur bike aside) I some how again crossed the road and pulled my bike with my injured shoulder, horrible!
I somehow managed to put my bike aside and went back to the PCR van. I asked for some First Aid, and the answer was “First Aid wid nahi hoti, haspatal jana padega (there's no First-Aid, you need to go to hospital)” I agreed on that then they called a so called “emergency van” to take me to the hospital. It is so called “emergency” because, I waited for some 30-45 minutes for this. Meanwhile I called my father and my CTO(Utkarsh), informed them about the incident...............!
After some 30-40 minutes my so called emergency van arrived to take me to Safdarganj Hospital. So they handed me over to these guys, for Medical Checkup. The two policemen inside the van are nice, one was driving and the second one asked me about what and how's of the incident. After I explained the incident to him, he said “.....beta aaram se let jaa, ab Safdarganj me uthna (Son, lie down, and wakeup at Safdarganj)......” .
As I lied down on the strature tried to notice the things around me in the van. First thing I noticed was a first-aid box ofcours without first-aid, next was an oxygen cylender whose mask was broken and was tied with a plastic rope, cleaniness and hygene was like an missing word in the dictonary of Delhi Police.
We reached at hospital, they took me to emergency where they asked all my details like my name, father's name, address, etc., and created a MLC of mine and passed it on to the one of the doctor. Scene inside the emergency was the more horrible, as on a cubical desk there were around 5 doctors sitting surrounded by 50 people everybody with some paper in their hand approaching towards the doctors. So I waited aside for my turn, and finally when he(doctor) called me and asked that “.......thumara naam Ram Shankar hai? (are you Ram Shankar)............” I replied “Yes”, the gave a stool to me to sit beside him. He asked about the incident, once again I explained the whole blah.......blah......! In between, some other doctor called him and hey started gossipping ..............my my......! There are around 30-40 patients surrounding these doctors and they are chatting like anything...............!
He asked me about the areas which are in pain, I told him.......then he wrote something on my paper and said “...........room number 20 me chale jaao(go to room number 20).........” . So I tried to locate Room No 20, and finally got it, even got scared when I read a board on the room's door “......Kutte ke injection (Dog's bitten injection)...........” . I enquired and found that I'll get a Tetnus injection here. So I gave my “parcha” to the nurse over there and then came one of the most humourious moments, when they asked “.............patient kahan hai? (where's the patient)..........”. I said “.......maine hoon(I'm)........” . She stared on me for a while and then said “loose your pant's and lie down on the strature”. She gave an injection and I asked her about what's next.
She wrote something on my “parchi” and said “..........go to Room No. 18............”, as I went there I found a ward boy and handed over my parchi to him. he put some medicine on my shoulder and taken me for X-Ray. In the X-Ray room he said “ ...........joote utar kar leet jaao, abhi doctor saab aate ahi( put off your shoes, and lie down on the strature, doctor is coming)...................”, so I done what was directed, and lied down on the X-Ray strature, after a while a person came and took the X-Ray and said “.............bahar jaa kar baith jaao(go and sit outside)............” I waited for a while and then the wardboy came and took me to the Orthopedics department. While walking down the corridore, one thing came in mind was “How these guys treat the patient so inhumanly”, “Why they do so?”, “Are not we human being, treated like animals in these hospitals, police stations, courts?”......and blah......blah...........
With my “parchi” and helmet on my hands and my bag on my shoulders we reached Orthopedics department, scene here was similar to the emergency. Number of patients are higher than the number of beds, we went to one of the doctors and he asked about the whole incident, again the whole blah.......blah......, he said to one of the chlid patient's mother to take him aside and told me to lie downon the rest of the bed. After the diagnosis, once again the doctor wrote something on the parchi, and said, “go for X-Ray”, I replied that I already did, but he said it was for MLC, it means I need to go to orthopedics X-Ray department, where I have to wait for my turn and afterwards one more hour for the X-Ray reports.
That was it, I decided not to go for it although I made the registration for but I decieded to leave.
Few questions that came in my mind are:
Is this the way we get treated by our administration(police, hospital, court)?
Did we forgot that we are humans and we should respect every human beign?
Do we really care about human life?
What ever it was it was not the end of it many people face much bitter problems than I faced, but in my new life I'll whenever required help the mankind, will give more respect to humans as this would be the only way to thank my God almighty!
Thankyou God!