Tihar provides medical treatment, special diet

Acting on complaints of senior Maoist operative Kobad Ghandy, who is currently lodged in Tihar Jail, the jail administration has referred him for adequate medical treatment to the city-based Gobind Ballabh Pant Hospital, reports Abhishek Sharan.

Acting on complaints of senior Maoist operative Kobad Ghandy, who is currently lodged in Tihar Jail, the jail administration has referred him for adequate medical treatment to the city-based Gobind Ballabh Pant Hospital.

HT Image

A jail official who requested anonymity because he was not authorised to talk the media said Ghandy, arrested last Monday, had complained to jail number three’s superintendent about “needing urgent medical attention since he is suffering from prostate cancer”.

The official said: “After his complaint, he is being taken to the jail's hospital daily and the GB Pant hospital.”

“Ghandy has been to the Pant hospital once and is to meet his doctor there again on Wednesday,” said the official.

He said Ghandy would be provided a special diet that might be prescribed to him.

As a “humanitarian gesture”, the official said: “Ghandy is already being provided eggs and fruits as dietary supplements on request.”

Before being taken to the GB Pant Hospital, Ghandy was treated at Bara Hindu Rao Hospital too.

A city court had earlier asked the authorities to refer him to either the GB Pant Hospital or the All Indian Institute of Medical Sciences.

Ghandy currently enjoys the status of a “high security prisoner” due to his membership of the banned Communist Party (Maoist)’s central committee, the apex decision-making body.

Ghandy is lodged in a cell meant for the under-trials.

Rights group claims mistreatment

A human rights organisation, The Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners (CRPP), in its press note sent to HT, said Ghandy had complained to his lawyer — Rajesh Tyagi, who met him last Thursday — that he was kept in “a cell occupied by three other inmates though it was meant for just one due to which he developed breathing problems”.

When asked, the jail official said Ghandy cannot be lodged in a solitary cell, according to the norms, “A new inmate is never kept alone to avoid

any chance of him committing suicide.”

The CRPP release also

said Ghandy was not getting “the life saving drug, Sorbitrate, for acute chest pain and dizziness… after being shifted to Tihar Jail”.

The jail official denied

this and said Ghandy was getting “the requisite medical attention”.

The CRPP has also demanded “Ghandy be provided materials to read and write, prescribed diet with boiled/safe water, a cell not overcrowded”.

It also opposed any police move to conduct narco test on Ghandy since it might “endanger his life”.