Compensation a pittance, say victims

Three victims of the September 7 Delhi high court blast are still running from pillar to post for their due compensation. The victims allege that despite such a serious loss, their injuries have been mentioned as minor in the medical report.

Three victims of the September 7 Delhi high court blast are still running from pillar to post for their due compensation.

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Anil Kumar, Mahesh and Ramesh Chandra suffered from a ruptured eardrum in the blast and still haven’t regained their hearing power completely.

The victims allege that despite such a serious loss, their injuries have been mentioned as minor in the medical report. They claimed they had been given a compensation of Rs 20,000 whereas they were entitled to Rs 2,00,000 as their injuries were grave.

“I underwent an eardrum repair surgery at Safdarjung Hospital. I stayed there for 15 days and I still can’t hear properly,” said Anil Kumar, a street vendor.

Mahesh, on the other hand, has refused the Rs 10,000 given to him by the government as he felt the amount was an insult to him. “I have spent more than Rs 15,000 only on medicine. I have lost the sense of hearing in my right ear, but according to doctors at RML hospital, this is a minor injury,” said Mahesh.

“It has been 40 days since the blast. We have been running from the hospital to the SDM office, but little has been done to provide relief to these financially weak victims,” said Ashok Randhawa, the social worker who is fighting for the cause of these victims.

“The hospital authorities still haven’t sent us the complete documents on these victims. We have written to them, but we can’t do anything till we get a proper reply from the medical authorities,” said DK Mishra, deputy commissioner, New Delhi district.

Despite repeated attempts, no one from RML hospital was ready to comment.