Doctor said the victims died of injuries and with sand, soil,water entering lungs
Rescue team inside the Tapovan tunnel in Chamoli (SNS)
After a major blunder created by a government doctor, on administrative duty in the flash flood-hit area, the Chamoli district administration had to launch a massive damage control exercise on Tuesday.
The doctor was speaking to a news channel on Tuesday in which he said that out of the 11 bodies recovered, the postmortem report of six persons indicates that they were alive for 4-5 days inside the tunnel.
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G.S Rana, chief medical officer, Chamoli, said, “I had provided administrative charge to Dr MS Khati. I have studied all the postmortem reports and it indicated that victims died of heavy injuries and with sand, soil and water entering their lungs. Dr Khati had not performed any postmortem.”
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The Chamoli Police also issued a clarification claiming that the news was bogus and false. The tunnel got packed with water, slush, debris and boulders after the 7 February flash flood. Clearing the slush, debris and boulders from the tunnel has been underway since the past nine days. A challenging task with different agencies including ITBP, NDRF, SDRF and others are being executed at the affected site.
It was a day of clarification. Uttarakhand Police clarified that there is no effort to conclude the search and rescue operation in another 3-4 days.
Uttarakhand DGP Ashok Kumar said, “I would like to clarify that all search, rescue and relief operations will continue. We will continue the operation till the last missing person is found.”
So far 58 bodies have been recovered and 146 others are still missing. After interacting with local villagers, the local administration has started search operation in new locations.
The casual comments of the health department police department created huge embarrassment for the Uttarakhand government.
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