An eight-month-old child died after being administered an injection allegedly by a rickshaw-puller,on Tuesday night at the district hospital in Ballia. A life-saving drug was to be administered to the child,who was brought to the hospital in serious condition. A preliminary inquiry revealed that the alleged rickshaw-puller had unofficially been working as a helper with the paramedical staff in the hospital for the last two to three years. An FIR was registered against Dr Viresh Kumar,who was on duty at the emergency ward on Tuesday night,Shrikant ,the pharmacist,and the accused,identified as Raju. No arrests have been made yet. The FIR was registered on a complaint by Sapna Devi,the childs grandmother. The accused were booked under Section 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the Indian Penal Code. According to the police,the incident came to light after the childs mother Seema Devi,who lived with her mother at Kirtupur village in Bansdih locality,raised an alarm on Tuesday night. She said her child,Ajay,died due to an injection given by Raju. Seema had brought Ajay to the hospital on Monday,where he was admitted to the general ward in serious condition. Police said his condition worsened on Tuesday afternoon,and she was then asked by the ward doctor to go to the emergency ward and get a life-saving drug injected into him. Seema went to the emergency ward,where the youth reportedly administered the injection. Subsequently,Ajays condition deteriorated and he died later that evening. Ballia ADM,Khem Pal Singh,who conducted a preliminary inquiry,said,We could not question the accused as he had escaped. Inquiries revealed that he had been a helper for the paramedical staff. If somebody died in the hospital,he would take the body to the post-mortem house. Sometimes he would fetch an odd injection or a bandage,apparently for a few rupees. It is,however,clear that he was untrained for any medical procedure. Some TV news channels,meanwhile,showed footage in which the youth was seen making claims about his ability to handle injections and bandages,which he would do for a few rupees. He claimed he had been doing such things at the hospital for several years. He would also take dead bodies from the hospital to the mortuary on his rickshaw. ASP (Ballia) K C Goswami,It was not that there were no doctors or pharmacists present in the ward. None of them have been able to explain how an unauthorised person managed to administer an injection to a child,whose condition was already precarious.
