AURANGABAD: Family members and community leaders of Baburpura were deeply divided if they should break furniture and glasses of RML Hospital after a local resident died in the hospital.
Ransacking hospitals and attacking doctors after a patient’s death is a widely popular form of paying tribute to the departed soul in the region, but doctors and staff at RML hospital were shell shocked to witness no such activity even after 5 hours of a patient passing away.
“We have been wearing helmets instead of surgical masks for 5 hours now, expecting them to go full crazy and start hitting us anytime. But I can’t believe our luck! Not even a notebook has been torn by them yet!” Dr. Ramesh Ambedkar shared his joy and bewilderment when our reporter reached out for comment.
“But we are not taking any chances. They can still go on a rampage anytime. The dead boy is still lying in the hospital,” he added.
Abdul Ahwad, a 56-year-old patient was admitted with symptoms of coronavirus on 10 April 2020, and his reports came positive two days later. He was admitted into the hospital though was not quarantined or kept in isolation.
“The family was simply not ready to leave Abdul alone. They said they wanted to see for themselves if we are treating him well. We were just too afraid to offend or anger them,” Dr. Ambedkar, who is also the head doctor at the hospital, explained to Junta Ka Reporter why such a decision was taken.
On 10th April itself, Abdul was prescribed “5 time namaaz” (pray to the almighty Allah five times in a day) by one of the resident doctors as “sharitya ilaaj” (guaranteed treatment) to all the ailments. No other medication or treatment was offered to Abdul. Abdul passed away on 20th April after offering namaaz 50 times.
“I can not reveal the name of the doctor due to security concerns, and I can’t even say whether he did the right thing or wrong. Let us wait for at least 48 hours,” Dr. Ambedkar said adjusting his helmet.
If sources are to be believed, Abdul’s family and friends are itching to break everything in the hospital, but they have held it back as it might be considered blasphemy.
“We beat up doctors and damage hospital property after accusing them of not providing the best treatment or care, but if we do that now, we will be essentially saying that ‘5 times namaaz’ is not the best treatment. Astaghfirullah!” Abdul’s cousin Abdullah shared his predicament.
Family has been consulting everyone to figure out what should be their next step. “Our young cousin Zainab Sikandar, who works in a PR agency in Delhi, is asking us to not waste even a minute and start beating up the doctors. She says that the prescription was a conspiracy by the doctor. We discussed with her on a video call just an hour back where she did ‘thoo on us’ for not beating up any doctor yet,” Abdullah revealed.
“Don’t know why but she had asked us to wear saffron clothes while beating up the doctors. That was weird suggestion. Which is why we are not taking her seriously,” Abdullah further revealed.
In contrast to youngster’s wild and energetic ideas, family elders are suggesting a more nuanced view on the whole situation in order to not commit a blasphemy, which could potentially lead themselves to get beaten up by others in the region.
“Five times namaaz is the best medicine, there is no denying that. We can’t say that the doctors didn’t try their best. They didn’t even keep Abdul in quarantine where we could have accused them of trying to secretly poison him. We were allowed to freely cough here and there in the corridors too. So, we are yet to find a strong reason to start ransacking the hospital,” Sheikhuddin, a local community leader and family friend of Abdul said.
