60-year-old Siddamma would perhaps have been alive today if she had received proper medical treatment, on time. It was nearly an hour after she was hit by a bike that her son Ninganna was able to get her to the hospital, The New Indian Express reported.
Last week, Siddamma, with her son, had gone to meet her daughter in Kalaburagi. She was walking on the road outside the house when a bike hit her, injuring her head and leg.
Ninganna immediately called for an ambulance and even pleaded to nearby commuters, but received no help for nearly 45 minutes.
The TNIE report states that there was police escort jeep stationed near the spot, but they too did not offer any help.
Feeling helpless, Ninganna carried his mother's unconscious body and started walking. Some passersby then urged the police escort jeep which then took them to the hospital.
The government hospital she was taken to administered first aid to her and asked Ninganna to move her to a private establishment which had the facilities to treat her.
Siddamma died a day later in the private hospital.
Just earlier this month, an old woman had to drag her 71-year-old ill husband along the floor of a government hospital in Shivamogga after he was denied a stretcher.
Her husband, who is disabled, was asked to get an X-Ray scan and when the woman asked the hospital staff for a stretcher, she was allegedly asked to cough up Rs 100.
The woman did not have the money and was forced to drag him to the X-Ray room.
In another glaring incident of apathy, a pregnant woman was denied a stretcher at the Government Hospital in Karnataka's Bidar district.