By IANS,
Lucknow : Sportswoman Arunima Sinha, whose crushed left leg was amputated after robbers threw her off a running train last week, will now be shifted to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi for treatment, doctors here said Monday.
The decision followed detection of a serious infection for which she underwent a second round of surgery at the prestigious King George’s Medical College (KGMC) (now upgraded to the Chattrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical University) here Sunday.
Earlier Monday, union Sports Minister Ajay Maken came to meet Arunima at the hospital and offered to shift her to New Delhi for specialised treatment. Doctors attending on her also thought the AIIMS was better-equipped to deal with her case.
“Even though we have succeeded in controlling the infection she had caught on during the course of hospitalisation in Bareilly and in Lucknow, there was no doubt that AIIMS was better equipped to provide her more modern treatment,” Vineet Sharma of the KGMC’s orthopaedics department told reporters.
“A decision was, therefore, taken by the hospital administration in consultation with the state government to refer the patient to AIIMS,” he said.
“The Uttar Pradesh government had also offered a state plane to carry Arunima to New Delhi this (Monday) evening itself,” he added.
Meanwhile, political parties left no stone unturned to earn brownie points by displaying their sudden sympathy for Arunima.
Ahead of Maken’s visit, state Sports Minister Ayodhya Prasad Pal visited Arunima and offered her a job in the sports department.
Arunima, a national level volleyball player, was pushed out of the general compartment of the Padmawati Express near Bareilly April 11 for resisting a chain-snatching attempt by some hoodlums while travelling from Lucknow to Delhi.
She lost her left leg when it came under the wheels of another train passing on the parallel rail track.
Railway police carried her to the local district hospital where she lay injured, traumatised and unconscious until Wednesday morning.
She was shifted from the Bareilly District Hospital to the orthopaedics department at the KGMC here Saturday to ensure expert management of her wounds.
Arunima was Thursday offered a job by the Indian Railways, three days after the incident happened.
The sports ministry, which had earlier offered her a paltry Rs.25,000 compensation, hiked this to Rs.2 lakh following a public outcry.
The Indian Railways also offered Sinha “all financial assistance” besides a suitable job.
Financial assistance also followed from state Chief Minister Mayawati, who gave her Rs.1 lakh, as well as from several other voluntary organisations and individuals.