YOUR FUNNY MAN

You might be angry

But you always have cute face

The smeared memory

And joy with fun just in case

The hollow poems of my heart

Haunt a piece of mind

For life is like a bullock cart

And want a just in kind

When will I meet you

I don`t know

But I will always be your

Hilarious, entertaining funny man.

                                                              -Rajesh  Patnaik

INCIDENT 4

Postmortem

17march 2003

Daman city

Today it was a hectic schedule.  Havens, pujas everything had to be organized in a single day.  Needless to say you might be wondering why suddenly havens in the hospitals?  The answer lies in pages of my attendance diary under the date 1 march 2000.  On this day a bloody body as a case of accident had come to the hospital.  Dr. Amitabh were to attend it, he did and then sent the body for postmortem.  Unluck starts when the body comes for postmortem.  Postmortem is such an awful job.  Initially the head is cut and brain is checked, then the digestive system and terminating with heart and lungs.  While examining the heart for a moment I felt that it was beating but the body`s temperature proved about his death.. Finally sealing everything, it was concluded to be a natural death.  After sunset, postmortem is not done. Therefore the room was closed and re examination was to be done, the next morning.  That night something happened, security guard and the doom boy were very badly beaten up.  The next morning they were found wounded and lying in blood pool. The doctor on duty said he did not hear anything.  The doom boy on gaining consciousness uttered-“aatma” got a very bad scolding from me.  Police came, enquired and left.  Now since then in every two day the hospital working staff started facing problems.  The ward boys were unusually beaten, the scissors and forceps disappeared, and the receptionist got blank calls and sometimes fake calls of      

Accident cases, the ambulances were unimportantly disturbed.  After 15 days, on a serious note Dr. Amitabh was attacked, he suffered head injuries went into a state unconsciousness.  When he regained consciousness, he started bluffing and muttering nonsense, started speaking about some man named Dinesh.  On examining his words it was understood that he is confessing on killing a patient as neglection.  Our head doctor said that he has lost his brain and cannot be cured.  I immediately came towards the morgue. I asked the watchman, “Who was it?”  He silently said-“sir, the accident patient of March 1…you remember, he is taking revenge….”  I immediately went into record room, took out the file on morgue history and opened March 1.  There was no entry of the person. Photographs, report everything gone.  I checked morgue room the body was unclaimed but it wasn’t there either. All of us were in a fix.  Then I remembered it was the same person whom I had postmortem in 1992.  I checked 1992 record, he was there. The report read

“DATE: MARCH 4 1992

PATIENT NAME: Dinesh Kumar

CAUSUALTY: accident and loss of blood

….

….

…

POSTMORTEM TIME: 2:00 pm

POSTMORTEM AREA: Daman City Hospital

POSTMORTEM DONE BY:  Dr. Debashish Ganguly

SIGNATURE:  Debashish       “

   The report itself said everything and I informed this matter to our head doctor and then today the haven was done.  Now I realize sometimes being a doctor may land you in serious trouble.

Debashish Ganguly

INCIDENT 3

Mrs. Joseph’s Plant

4 JUNE 1999

PLACE: Daman

Dear diary,

Interesting information to share with you.  You remember few days ago Mrs. Joseph gave us her plants to look after them as she was going to her native? There was something which I experienced for the first time.  No doubt those cute bonsai plants were cute enough to be loved. The day when Mrs. Joseph gave those plants, around 5 in the evening an old man approached us.  Vineet, my husband asked his identity and there he replied to be Mrs. Joseph`s relative.  He said he would come to water those bonsai every evening.  We thought that Mrs. Joseph did not want us give much trouble and therefore she had arranged a gardener for her plants.  He used to come every day and water his plants, but never spoke anything with us.  Finally Mrs. Joseph arrived yesterday and she was pleased to see her plants.  Vineet and I went to deliver her plants and there I told her about the gardener she had arranged; now the twist came here.   While filling the water cane in the kitchen, she told that she had asked none of her relatives to water her Bonsai.  Now that was mysterious but the very next moment we heard Vineet shout from the hall.  Both of us ran to the hall to see that Vineet stood dumbstruck.  He just pointed something on the wall.  He pointed towards a photo on the wall, the photo of the same old man who claimed to be Mrs. Joseph`s relative. The photo read “IN REMEMBRANCE OF MR. SAMEUL JOSEPH” and below that “1940-1989”.  A freaky feeling ran down our nerves.  Mrs. Joseph told us that bonsai plants were his favorite and few days before was his 10^th death anniversary.  Vineet and I did not disclose anything to her and we pretended to be very stupid for the behavior.  Guess what?  We came home and wondered about it silently and now today morning both of us pretended that we have forgotten everything but the feeling still persists.

Priya Mathur