The bandaged face of fifteen-year-old Insha Mushtaq is blood-smeared. Her cousin Vakeel Ahmed attending this Class 9 student says that CRPF and Army went on rampage in their hometown Sedav Shopian on Sunday. “Insha was watching mayhem out on roads from second-storey of her house lying close by the road,” Vakil says. “Forces targeted her, and left her bleeding.”
She was immediately shifted to Sub-District Hospital Shopian, where her condition was declared critical and she was rushed to SMHS Srinagar. Three days have passed and Insha is yet to show any sign of recovery.
What has distressed the family is the doctor’s assertion: “We are doing our best. Rest, it is all in the hands of Almighty.”
As casualties and pellet-pored people keep arriving at SMHS, the doctors despite doing their best are expressing their helplessness in the face of critical wounds being inflicted on Kashmiris.
Insha has suffered from eye traumatic evisceration. Explaining her condition, one medico says that her right eye ball is out from socket. “This is not the only complicacy Insha is suffering from,” he says. “Her left eye has also been damaged by pellets. Due to penetration of pellets, air has got induced into Insha’s brain known as ‘nemocephalus’, making her condition very critical.”
Nearby Insha, a father is haplessly looking at his ‘half-dead’ daughter, Shameema.
With tears, the father, who is in his mid-fifties says, “my daughter was shot in her abdomen, when forces fired indiscriminately upon a procession in Bijbehera.” Bullet has hit her lower vertebra, paralysing her forever now.
Another patient battling for his life in SMHS’s ICU is fair complexioned boy Aamir. He is lying like a corpse. Unmoved, his head is whirled in bandage. His father attending him says, “my son was fired by forces in Kulgam when he was watching a roadside procession.”
Aamir’s medical records reveal that bullet has pierced his brain, resulting into excessive bleeding. His condition is said to be critical.
A 60-year-old Manzoor Ahmed from Islamabad was fired upon by forces, when there was a huge procession at Islamabad. Like young Aamir, Manzoor has received bullet in brain causing excessive bleeding.
In all these cases, the doctors’ seeking divine intervention is enough to highlight the gravity of situation prevailing in valley.
