Vagrant Joydeb Dutt had been lying unattended to outside Medical College and Hospital for three days last week. On Friday, he was taken in and after surgery, is recovering swiftly. A Telegraph picture

It’s a rebirth of sorts for Joydeb Dutt.

Exactly a week ago, he was lying unattended to in front of Medical College and Hospital, with severe wounds in his head and ear and maggots boring into his brain. Now, he is recovering after surgery and may soon be declared fit.

“I was told that the patient, admitted in the general surgery ward, is recovering,” said Amarendra Nath Biswas, the deputy superintendent of Medical College and Hospital.

“Ami ekhon onek bhalo achhi (I am much better now),” said Dutt on Friday, his voice barely audible.

He can hardly be identified as the man who had been lying unattended to for three days outside the emergency gate a week ago. He was finally admitted on August 10 — a vagrant and an alcoholic, with flies buzzing around him.

According to hospital sources, who wished to remain anonymous, doctors suspect that Dutt’s problem started with an ear ailment, which was neglected for a long time. As a result, the entire ear became infected. The wound being exposed, turned gangrenous. Things could have turned worse had it not been for last week’s intervention.

A team of surgeons worked at Dutt’s wounds for hours, removing the maggots one by one and cleaning the wound. He was then transferred to the general surgery ward.

Dutt is now able to sit up and eat by himself, said the doctors. “This is going to help him recover faster, otherwise we would have had to put him on drip and feed him intravenously,” one of them said.

Last Friday, after the hospital authorities admitted him, they denied that the man had been lying unattended to for three days, saying he had arrived on his own on Thursday night. Witnesses, however, had contradicted this version and said the patient was taken in only after journalists arrived on the spot and took his pictures. His family could not, however, be traced.