Badal admitted to PGI with common cold

Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal was admitted to the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, late on Friday night after he caught a cold.

Sources said Badal was shifted to the hospital’s respiratory intensive care unit on a wheelchair around 10.25 pm. Dr D Dehra, head of PGIMER’s pulmonary department, said Badal was suffering from a minor infection and was stable. He said the chief minister will be discharged on Saturday morning.

Harcharan Bains, national affairs and media adviser, Punjab, said Badal fell ill after he spent hours in an open ground at Uraparh village in Nawanshahr, where the chief minister held a Sangat Darshan programme.

Bains said the chief minister was first taken to a private hospital in Nawanshahr, but later brought to PGIMER “to save time and as a precautionary measure”.

Punjab education minister Daljit Singh Cheema, Badal’s private secretary SK Sandhu, special principal secretary Gaggan Brar and adviser to the deputy chief minister were present at PGIMER.

Read: Punjab CM braves fever, cold weather to attend sangat darshan

First Published: Jan 22, 2016 23:17 IST