Monday, September 16, 2019

Chennai: Inspector turns midwife, helps woman deliver baby on roadside

TNN | Sep 15, 2019, 06.43 AM IST   CHENNAI: 


A woman police inspector on night patrol turned guardian angel for a 26-year-old woman in labour and helped her deliver a boy by the roadside with the help of some rag pickers in Choolaimedu in the wee hours on Friday. New mom Banumathi and her son are said to be doing fine at the Kilpauk Medical College and Hospital where they were admitted.

Inspector S Chitra was on her weekly night rounds in Choolaimedu when she found the pregnant woman crying for help on Nelson Manickam Road. Banumathi’s husband Vasanthakumar had gone to get an autorickshaw to take her to a hospital. The couple did not have a cellphone to call for an ambulance.

“She was unable to bear the pain as her water broke. She was well into labour and needed immediate attention,” said Chitra, recalling the experience.

“I decided to take the woman to a hospital in my patrol vehicle, but she had started crowning and a rag picker nearby advised me against it,” said the 2004-batch officer.

With time running out, Chitra asked her driver M Padmavathi to alert a ‘108’ ambulance and mustered courage to tend to the woman herself. Using towels from her car and the support of the rag pickers around, the group walked the woman through the labour, helping her deliver a boy.

“We cut the umbilical cord using pen-knife but didn’t have any clip/ band to tie it. I snatched the twine from which a Lord Hanuman figurine was suspended in my car and used it to tie the cord,” said the officer, a mother of two.

Soon, a ‘108’ ambulance arrived and Banumathi’s husband reached the spot. The mother and child were sent to the hospital. “Only after sending them I realised that I hadn’t even asked the woman her name. Her husband gave me their details as I wanted to visit the child later,” Chitra said.

Appreciation has been pouring in for inspector Chritra and driver Padmavathi since. They were rewarded by city police commissioner A K Viswanathan on Saturday.

Saying she would remember the incident for all her life, Chitra said, “For those 15 minutes, I was not a police officer. All that was in my mind was that two lives were at risk. I never knew I was capable of such a thing.”

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