'Delay in medical aid killed my daughter'

Her six-year-old daughter comes running to her with pieces of a puzzle, saying: "Mama, see I'm making a camera."

Her six-year-old daughter comes running to her with pieces of a puzzle, saying: "Mama, see I'm making a camera."

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The little girl cannot understand why her mother, Kanti Rawat, 41, is crying. She does not realise that her older sister, 18-year-old Shivani Rawat, will never come back.

Shivani was killed after her friend lost control of his car and crashed into a tree while they were returning from a pub in Bandra in the early hours of Saturday. Of the six youngsters in the car, two other girls remain critical.

"I can't believe that my daughter is no more. When I saw her after the accident, she did not have any visible abrasions on her body. She even acknowledged my presence. I thought she would live, but she passed away," said Shivani's mother, a homemaker who lives with her family at LIC Colony, Vile Parle (west).

Kanti said Shivani had met her five friends, involved in the accident, during the course of her job at an events management firm where she worked.

"I want to meet the boy [the driver, Rahul Mishra] and ask him why he has done this to us. They tell me he was driving at 140 km/hr. How could he not be more careful? Where did he think he was driving," she burst out.

Rawat alleges that though the accident occurred at 1.30 am, Shivani did not receive medical aid until 6.30 am. The family was informed about the incident at 4 am.

"We immediately rushed to Cooper hospital, but found that she was just put on glucose drip and that no proper treatment was being given. We then took her to Asha Parekh hospital, but they suggested that we take her to Nanavati as they didn't have ventilators. Her treatment started at Nanavati five hours after the accident. If there was no delay, my daughter would have been alive," she said.

Dr SS Chirmule, medical superintendent of Cooper Hospital, Vile Parle, said: "Shivani was brought to the hospital at about 3am. She had multiple fractures that required CT scan investigation. We don't have the machine in our hospital. Her relatives volunteered to take her to a private hospital at 5 am."

Shivani's aunt, Laxmi Verma, 47, recollects the girl's last words. "Shivani said, 'Bahut dard ho raha hai, aunty [it's hurting badly].' She has left us with a life-long sorrow," she said, tears rolling down her cheeks.