Human Rights Sentinel
Hospital abuzz with Sharmila’s health:
Imphal, Jan. 4: Hospital authorities are worried over the “deteriorating” health of Manipur’s human rights crusader Irom Sharmila who has refused nasal feeding for the past 12 days.
Sharmila, who has been on a fast unto death since November 2000, is surviving only on nasal feeding for more than seven years now in the security ward of Imphal’s Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital.
Doctors and nurses attending on the crusader today confirmed that Sharmila is being fed only once at 9pm instead of the regular five times a day.
“She did not give any reason for her refusal to accept the feeding,” one of the nurses attending on her said. She has not made any complaints either. “She takes a walk regularly and does yoga,” the nurse said.
The nurses speculated that Sharmila could be disturbed by the death of eight bus passengers in a bomb blast at Pourabi in Imphal East district on December 16.
But medical experts warned that if this continued, her health would deteriorate.
Concerned over the development, the superintendent of the hospital, W. Motilal Singh, said the hospital staff was persuading the crusader to accept the regular feeding, but to no avail.
“We will have to decide on a course of action if she persists with her refusal. Now we are taking more care and paying more attention to her with doctors and nurses remaining by her side day and night,” the superintendent said.
The hospital has an option -- of asking Sharmila to return to Sajiwa Jail. “This tactic worked in the past. Once when Sharmila refused to accept the nasal feeding and spurned all our appeals, we told her to go back to jail. Only then she agreed to resume her feeding,” a doctor said.
On New Year’s day, Sharmila met chief minister Okram Ibobi Singh to remind him of her demand for the repeal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. Ibobi Singh persuaded her to end the fast or at least take the regular feeding. Sharmila rejected the appeal, saying she would not end the fast till the army act was withdrawn from Manipur.
Her family members also expressed concern. “We have nothing to say. She decided to go on this path and we cannot tell her to end (her) agitation. We are fully behind her decision as she is fighting for the cause of human rights,” her brother, Irom Singhajit, said.
Babloo Loitongbam, the executive director of Human Rights Alert, Manipur, said the Ibobi Singh government should be held responsible if anything happened to Sharmila.
Posted On: The Telegraph
Imphal, Jan. 4: Hospital authorities are worried over the “deteriorating” health of Manipur’s human rights crusader Irom Sharmila who has refused nasal feeding for the past 12 days.
Sharmila, who has been on a fast unto death since November 2000, is surviving only on nasal feeding for more than seven years now in the security ward of Imphal’s Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital.
Doctors and nurses attending on the crusader today confirmed that Sharmila is being fed only once at 9pm instead of the regular five times a day.
“She did not give any reason for her refusal to accept the feeding,” one of the nurses attending on her said. She has not made any complaints either. “She takes a walk regularly and does yoga,” the nurse said.
The nurses speculated that Sharmila could be disturbed by the death of eight bus passengers in a bomb blast at Pourabi in Imphal East district on December 16.
But medical experts warned that if this continued, her health would deteriorate.
Concerned over the development, the superintendent of the hospital, W. Motilal Singh, said the hospital staff was persuading the crusader to accept the regular feeding, but to no avail.
“We will have to decide on a course of action if she persists with her refusal. Now we are taking more care and paying more attention to her with doctors and nurses remaining by her side day and night,” the superintendent said.
The hospital has an option -- of asking Sharmila to return to Sajiwa Jail. “This tactic worked in the past. Once when Sharmila refused to accept the nasal feeding and spurned all our appeals, we told her to go back to jail. Only then she agreed to resume her feeding,” a doctor said.
On New Year’s day, Sharmila met chief minister Okram Ibobi Singh to remind him of her demand for the repeal of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. Ibobi Singh persuaded her to end the fast or at least take the regular feeding. Sharmila rejected the appeal, saying she would not end the fast till the army act was withdrawn from Manipur.
Her family members also expressed concern. “We have nothing to say. She decided to go on this path and we cannot tell her to end (her) agitation. We are fully behind her decision as she is fighting for the cause of human rights,” her brother, Irom Singhajit, said.
Babloo Loitongbam, the executive director of Human Rights Alert, Manipur, said the Ibobi Singh government should be held responsible if anything happened to Sharmila.
Posted On: The Telegraph