Layers of fat slowed bid to extract bullets from body

It took almost five hours for forensic experts at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Sunday to look inside the layers of fat to extract bullets from the nearly 90-kg body of liquor baron Ponty Chadha.

It took almost five hours for forensic experts at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Sunday to look inside the layers of fat to extract bullets from the nearly 90-kg body of liquor baron Ponty Chadha.

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The exact location of the remaining three bullets could be ascertained and a re-autopsy was done later in the evening only after the Delhi Police provided the doctors a sophisticated metal detector.

The doctors could take out only one bullet during the first autopsy, despite the scan showing four bullets lodged inside his body.

“There is no botch-up. He was an obese person and to locate bullets inside the body of a person with high fat content is always difficult and takes time. We used the latest metal detector that the cops provided us during the second procedure and this helped us in locating the bullets,” said a senior doctor in the department of forensics at AIIMS.

In firearm injuries, first an X-ray is performed on the body to know the location of bullets and then the body is cut open. As a procedure, all bullets must be extracted from the body before it is handed over to the family.

“Our doctors tried for nearly five hours and tried to retrieve as many bullets as possible. It was a Sunday and we were working with half the strength. Getting scans done on a holiday is not easy,” said the doctor.

Rumours of a possible inquiry into the incident were also doing the rounds in the hospital on Monday, with a meeting having been held to discuss the matter.

“It is not a matter of inquiry as our doctors tried to do their best despite the limitations. We have an experienced staff that performs nearly 3,000 autopsies every year. There was absolutely no botch-up in this case,” said Dr DN Bhardwaj, head of forensic medicine, AIIMS.