This time by harassing Dr Tatyrao Lahane, Dean of JJ Hospitals and a renowned eye surgeon, who was awarded Padmashree for his service to humanity.
Nagpur : The official carrier of India, Air India, now infamous for its rampant strikes and shoddy service, is at it again and has proved its ‘mettle and reputation’ in rendering poor service, this time by harassing a medical doctor who was decorated for his yeoman service.
And the victim was Dr Tatyrao Lahane, Dean of JJ Hospitals and a renowned eye-surgeon, who was conferred with Padmashree for his noble service to humanity.
The story is like this: Dr Lahane boarded the Air India flight from Mumbai to reach Nagpur on December 14 (Friday) evening. He was scheduled to visit Baba Amte’s Anandvan to conduct eye-checkup of thousands of patients. The Doctor is well known for performing free eye-surgery, specially cataract operation, on over one lakh patients in Anandvan in a decade. He is also well known for his speed and accuracy in cataract surgery.
As most of these patients are extremely poor and can’t afford operation in private hospitals, in every December, Dr Lahane performs free eye-surgery on them at Anandvan. This year, he and his colleague Dr Ragini Parekh performed eye-surgery on December 8 and 9 on 1,700 patients out of which 90 were leprosy-hit inmates of Anandvan. On Saturday and Sunday (December 15 and 16), he was scheduled to check the eyes of those operated patients so as to monitor their progress.
As per his routine, the Doctor started the journey with his opthalmoscope (a key instrument to check the retina) in his travel bag. The bag was checked at the Mumbai Airport and sent to the baggage section. When he reached Nagpur in the evening, he found his bag with opthalmoscope missing. Within no time, the anxious Lahane inquired with officials and was shocked to know that the opthalmoscope was removed from the baggage as it was fitted with battery cell.
“Air India should have informed me at the Mumbai Airport itself and I would have removed the cells there itself. But they did not care to tell me even after landing at Nagpur,” he fumed.
The JJ Dean called up and talked to concerned Mumbai Airport officials Bernard and Alexander and requested them to send the bag by Saturday morning flight. He also showed the readiness to fax authorisation letter for breaking locks of the bags to remove cells from the opthalmoscope to the airport authorities. However, both of them promised to send the bag by Saturday morning flight.
Dr Lahane, who reached Anandvan on Friday night, sent a staff of Anandvan to Nagpur Airport, which is more than 110 kms away, in the hope of getting his precious instrument. It was another shock for Lahane when he was told that the bag was not sent by the said flight too.
“In my life time, I have always carried opthalmoscope with battery cells fitted in, but such a mishap has never happened,” he lamented.
” With past experiences, I generally avoid Air India, but this time I took a risk and now I am repenting. In future, I will never never travel by this airline,” Lahane told this correspondent. However, Dr Vikas Amte later managed to get the opthalmo-scope from a eye-surgeon from Chandrapur, a district headquarter 45 kms away.
Pramod Chunchuwar
