Cops guard discharged' Vasanthi in hospital

K Praveen Kumar / TNN / Aug 29, 2009, 04:16 IST

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The city police has made the fourth floor of Malar hospital a fortress in order to prevent anyone from meeting Vasanthi, the injured daughter-in-law of the couple who were shot dead in their Panayur home.

Cops guard discharged' Vasanthi in hospital

CHENNAI: The city police has made the fourth floor of Malar hospital a fortress in order to prevent anyone from meeting Vasanthi, the injured daughter-in-law of the couple who were shot dead in their Panayur home on Monday.
After the hospital announced that Vasanthi was being discharged on Thursday, she was moved to room number 401 on the police's instruction. A woman constable was posted on the floor. The constable said that an assistant commissioner has given her a list of 15 people who could meet Vasanthi. "We have strict orders not to allow anyone else to meet her," said Anbazhagan, a relative.

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Put to trouble are relatives and visitors of other patients on the floor. "My one-and-a-half-year old son who had a heart surgery is admitted to a ward on the same floor. The police are not allowing me to even stand in the corridor. There is no one else to take care of him," Surjith, a native of Theni district, told TOI. Surjith, his wife and other relatives were chased out of the corridor by the police and the hospital security. Pacing up and down the stairs, Surjith hopes that he would be allowed near his son.

The lobby of the hospital was crowded with attendants of patients on the fourth floor, many of them complaining of being shooed away by policemen. "We pay hefty amounts to get treated here. How can they stop us from attending to our dear ones?" another patient's relative said.
An employee of the hospital said when Vasanthi was kept in the intensive care unit, policemen kept walking in and out of the unit to make sure that nobody was talking to Vasanthi. If the patients getting infections is the concern, policemen marching in and out of ICU defeated the purpose, said a lift operator.
The hospital authorities had held a press conference on Thursday, explaining the medical procedures that save Vasanthi's life. The doctors also told reporters that the patient was being discharged. Late in the evening, Vasanthi was shifted to the fourth floor room.
praveen.kumar8@timesgroup.com

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