Jhansi: A grieving man was left outside the Jhansi Medical College with his dead wife on a stretcher and with no money to call for an ambulance.
It was 2 hours later when a police man saw a young man sitting with his wife’s corpse and their 8-year-old daughter crying next to the body. The police then called an organisation, and the organisation's treasurer arranged an ambulance free of cost.
According to reports by Bhaskar English, the body was taken to their home, which was 16 kms away from the Jhansi Medical College.
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Rahul Adivasi is a resident of a small village named Nakta near the Orchha area in Madhya Pradesh.
Rahul and his wife, Ramwati, worked as daily-wage labourers and were facing financial difficulties. They have three children, including two sons, Vijay (20) and Rakesh (15), and a daughter who is 8 years old.
According to the reports, Ramwati had not been keeping well for the past 15 days, but her condition got worse on Friday. Rahul, along with his daughter, took her to Orchha CHC when she started to have problems with breathing. The doctors at Orchha CHC advised him to take Ramwati to Jhansi.
Ramwati was taken to the Jhansi Medical College in an auto-rickshaw, but the doctors declared her dead soon after that.
Rahul was asked by the Jhansi Medical College hospital staff to book an ambulance and take his wife’s body home. But he was unable to manage the amount that was required to book an ambulance, so he took the body on a stretcher and brought it outside to the hospital’s parking lot.
Rahul told Bhaskar English that he took Ramwati to Jhansi Medical College, knowing it was a government health facility and he wouldn’t have to pay for anything for his wife’s treatment.
However, as his wife died at Jhansi Medical College Hospital, he was told to pay for the ambulance himself, but due to lack of finances, he couldn’t. He sat near his wife’s body while their 8-year-old cried, looking at her mother’s body, pleading with her to wake up.
A constable named Ajay found the family and called an organisation to arrange an ambulance.
Shyamsundar Sharma, treasurer of the Rajaram Volunteer Organization, said that when they reached Rahul’s village in the ambulance with his wife’s body, which was collected from outside the Jhansi Medical College, he saw that Rahul’s family was living very poorly.
Shyamsundar said, “When we visited the village, we saw that the family's financial condition was extremely poor. The family was living in a hut."
Sachin Mahaur, CMS Medical College, said that a hearse is provided to the family of patients who die in the emergency department. He suggested that maybe Rahul didn’t inform the doctors at the emergency department that he needed a hearse and therefore he was not provided one.
An investigation into the matter is ongoing.
(Rh/ARC)