A 28-year-old Amazon delivery executive held onto a school gate for 30 minutes to prevent further damage to a school girl whose cheek was pierced by a metal portion of the gate.
Timely help is what saved a 12-year-old girl on 1 July. The girl was playing near the gate of Vasant Vihar Municipal School in Thane, Maharashtra, where she studies when a metal portion of the gate pierced the girl’s cheek.
The school’s watchman started seeking help from passersby, and an Amazon delivery executive, Ravi Bhandari, stopped to help the girl. The heroic efforts of Bhandari and the doctor who showed up were tweeted by Pratik Salunke, who stays opposite the school and also came down to help.
Salunke hailed the efforts of Bhandari in a tweet and said that he held onto the gate for 30 minutes till help arrived.
Ravi, delivery boy of @amazonIN helped a girl who fet with a freak incident in Thane. She was playing on her school gate when it gave away and a part of iron pierced through her cheek, missing her right eye by an inch. Ravi hold on to the gate for 30 min untill help arrived.(1/2) pic.twitter.com/ydH700G72j
— Pratik Salunke (@pratik_salunke) July 1, 2022
The incident took place on Friday morning at around 10.30 am. But it was only 28-year-old Bhandari who stopped to help the screaming child.
Speaking to The Better India, Bhandari recalls the incident, “The small girl was trapped beneath the gate. I was driving by that area and heard the watchman saying, ‘Gate pakad’ (hold the gate). I immediately stopped my bike and got down. I saw that the girl was in so much pain and couldn’t free herself. I held onto the gate for 25-30 minutes till the doctor arrived.”
He adds that the metal portion had narrowly missed her eye and it was essential to hold the gate to ensure that her movements didn’t cause further damage.
Onlookers had informed the Vasant Vihar Hospital, and Dr Mushtaq Khan and nurses came to the spot.
“The doctor got tools and cut the part stuck inside her cheek. He administered injections, and then took her to the hospital,” adds Bhandari.
Speaking to The Free Press Journal, Ashwin Shetty, Managing Director, Vasant Vihar Hospital, said, “Dr Khan realised that the only option was to cut the metal piece so that the girl could be brought to the hospital. He called me up and we decided that the only equipment we could use as an implant cutter, which we use in amputations. With this tool, the metal piece stuck in the girl’s cheek was separated from the rest of the gate and she was rushed to the hospital.”
He also said that they did not charge the parents for the treatment.
With the tweet going viral, Bhandari has been getting calls from all over the country. When asked why he stopped, he says it was the only thing to do.
“We need to help one another. I have a 2.5-year-old daughter and wonder what would have happened had she been in her place,” says Bhandari.
He adds that monetary aid and appreciation has poured in from across the country. “A lot of people have been sending me money through Google Pay and other modes. However, I will not be using this money for myself and will be donating it to NGOs and trusts,” he concludes.
Sources
‘Thane: Metal piece of school gate gets embedded in face of 12-year-old’ by Gautam S Mengle for The Free Press Journal, Published on 03 July 2022
Edited by Yoshita Rao
