Adarsh Ajit
K L Chowdhury’s autobiographical short stories are written in flawless and beautiful prose. The tough medical terminology should have been facilitated with some footnotes for the readers.
In The Final Diagnosis Chowdhury discovers a lump on the neck of his cousin but advises his mother to go for his marriage. After the marriage there are different opinions about the lump but the most alarming is ‘highly malignant tumour’. After twenty-three years Chowdhury, while attending the funeral of his aunt in exile, finds his cousin Satish carrying the dead body of his mother.
Meera, a young KP girl, is forced to join as a teacher in Kashmir under Prime Minister’s Relief and Rehabilitation Plan. She faces blows of questions from her students:
‘Why don’t you convert and why don’t you marry Majid sir?’
But Meera faces major shock from her own community youths who reject her. One young man asks her to leave the job. Another youth tells her that her mother is from Doda. She has many questions full of intellectual fume:
‘Had exile taught them nothing? How could the Pandits claim to be intellectuals and liberated souls?’ The materialistic and immoral behaviour of her community members gives a chance to her Muslim student to fire a salvo:
‘What is your religion worth if you cannot find a suitable husband?’
Stroke at Noon is the story of the sunstroke of a KP woman. She represents the sad plight of a community struggling for survival in hostile conditions. The sad thing is that the relatives stop the doctor for using a bucket of water for their patient who is in coma. They say that they have no water to drink. The unknown patient’s obituary is seen in the newspaper in the morning.
In Brush with a Terrorist, the narrator-doctor is kidnapped by two armed insurgents in 1990 to treat their ailing commander who was wrongly diagnosed by a local doctor as having appendicitis. Earlier Leela Chowdhury, doctor’s gynaecologist wife, receives a threatening letter for charging exorbitant fee from the patients. The doctor is taken blindfolded in his own red car and on reaching there he finds commander’s ego crashing to the ground due to pain. He diagnoses the disease as renal colic, and suspects a stone in the kidney. After the injection is administered into the commander he assumes commander like style and threatens the erring doctors who fail to perform their duties. Chowdhury fearlessly rebukes him for bringing the situation to the lowest ebb. In the climax of the story, the commander offers Chowdhury the visiting fee and Chowdhury’s rebuttal is virtually like a thinker’s pun:
‘I have decided to treat patients free after my wife got a threatening letter from JKLF’.
In The Spit, Romesh has lost sleep and peace of mind due to the behaviour of his father-in-law. The father-in-law thinks that his son-in-law is responsible for his son’s decision to marry a girl against his wishes. Romesh goes to doctor a couple of times for treating his ‘spit phobia’. Consoling the patient Chowdhury tells him that even gods have been humiliated by their fathers-in-law. But the bigger wound concealed by Romesh is revealed in the end:
‘How do I get my wife back?’
Doctor asks: ‘What about your wife?’
And the reply comes:
‘My wife… she died of shame that her father caused her by spitting her husband’.
In another story Chwodhury’s eight-year-old grandson rings from United States telling him that he felt choked due to eating a piece of meat and that he has learnt Heimlich Manoeuvre. The story starts in a flashback when Chowdhury was doing house job. A child is brought to him for treatment who had become blue due to asphyxia. Even the beating of heart had stopped. Heimlich Manoeuvre was not known those days and the doctor/author had to cut the throat of the child and insert rubber tube for supply of oxygen. The morning newspaper carried the headline as:
‘Faith can move mountains’.
In The Crux of Clinical Decision Chowdhury differs with his boss over a patient who suffers a heart-attack. Dr. Chowdhury, who was an Assistant Professor at that time, confidently diagnoses it as a shock due to duodenal ulcer. His point is confirmed when the patient suffers from black motion. The patient is neither given Heparin prescribed by the professor nor is given blood which Chowdhury had advised. The story shows how ignorance, ego and overconfidence can kill a patient and how a junior doctor can confront his senior and save a patient.
The Spell is the story of unmarried Shabnam who has been made pregnant by Pir Shab. Her pregnancy is diagnosed by Chowdhury. Shabnam’s mother does not believe and goes back to Peer for undoing the evil spell. Pir gives her some powder and advises her to give it with water to her daughter. Shabnam starts bleeding profusely. To the utter surprise of Chowdhury her mother still believes that Pir has done the job. Pir must have given her daughter anti-pregnancy drug.
In Malignant Hiccup Kashi Nath, diagnosed with a heart attack avoids hospitalisation till his son comes from the USA but he reaches only to take part in mourning. After the days of mourning Vivek comes to see the doctor with his mother asking him:
‘Could you not have phoned an ambulance…? In the USA doctor in your situation could land in trouble for alleged negligence’.
‘But this is Kashmir….We can advise and persuade a patient, not force him against his will’. Chowdhury asks him:
‘How come you left them behind to fend for themselves in their old age?’
Vivek replies:
‘I often tried to persuade them to accompany me to the USA but I could not have forced them against their wishes’.
Another patient suffering from subdural haematoma is referred to AIMS. Interestingly AIMS sends the patient back with an impression that the patient is alright. But after some days the patient is taken to Chowdhury by his attendant. Having no facility there, the surgeons and Dr. Chowdhury operate upon him by drilling a bore. The patient recovers and is discharged.
A boy, who is a dwarf, wants to become tall as he is teased by other students. Dr Chowdhury suspects brain tumour and refers him to AIIMS for surgery. Unfortunately the boy dies. Without operation he could have lived few more years but his urge to grow taller proves fatal.
In an amazing story Romesh, who has passion for cricket, goes into coma. His brother puts the transistor near his ears. The commentary of a cricket match between India and Pakistan puts life into the patient and his recovery starts from the movement of his eyelids. . In another case Chowdhury diagnoses the pain of the left foot of a patient not due to disc-prolapse but due to brain tumour. Unfortunately the young patient dies due to negligent surgeon who was given undue promotion.
The stories in the book reflect author’s ability, passion, dedication, boldness, frankness, sincerity, practicality and connect with grass root level not only as a doctor but as a domestic counsellor and as a social scientist also. His suggestions are often taken as divine interventions. The book also discloses the scale of loyalty of the author towards fictional commitment.
Follow our WhatsApp channel
