Incredibly Inhuman

Few days back I had been for a pre-departure medical checkup to some desolate clinic in South Delhi, from where a medical clearance is mandatory before taking up employment in the Gulf, but I must admit that I was totally unprepared for the experience I went through. There is another face of India which remains hidden and is so far away from the world I have seen or expect that sometimes I am shocked by its existence.

Now my idea of a medical clinic is a neat place with doctors and practitioners running around; and some patients waiting for their turn. Also the clinics I have been to till date usually service Indian middle class, so the folks around are the kind you could commonly see in any market place. But upon arriving at this clinic I was surprised to find the place filled up with laborers, truck drivers, scavengers and some of their brethren. Most them were shabbily dressed in torn garments and some even smelled of beef. Add to this the matching attitude of doctors and administrators, with all shouting expletive abuses and pushing each other around.

All patients/clients were seated in a hall upon entry; some were seated on floor also, and were proceeding inside a narrow passageway as their name was being called one by one. Now if someone delayed to respond to his name call, he was shouted upon and abused and if not well-built also hit. Needless to say all laborers were used to this treatment being meted out and accepted it for good. I interacted with a few of them and learnt of their sorry existence, as many of them came from interiors of India and were somewhat charmed by the lucrative money in Gulf, the tough and inhuman conditions notwithstanding.

Soon my name was also called and I proceeded in the passageway where I entered the first room on way. Inside the room I was made to strip behind a curtain, with two doctors having a good look at my organ and the all important hole, my hands forcibly kept up all the time. Later I went to other rooms where blood, urine and unmentionable samples were taken, all the time I was roughed and pushed around. In one room filled-up injection syringes were kept and as patients entered, dosages were callously pushed inside their arms and they were pushed out to make way for the others behind, all done in a matter of seconds!

Thankfully the tests have declared me fit, results of which I have dispatched to apply for my Visa, but I shudder at the prospect of visiting such places ever again