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The RIMS building from where Oraon jumped on Friday. (Hardeep Singh)
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A young patient of depression from Bishunpur in Gumla district jumped off the third floor of Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Ranchi on Friday around 10am, but miraculously survived his suicide bid.
Ramjeet Oraon (25) fractured his left leg because he landed on a mound of soft soil. His condition is stable.
Around 10am, Ramjeet had been calmly sitting on a chair in the corridor of the state-run hospital at Bariatu, surrounded by his wife Prema Devi and other relatives, when he suddenly jumped up.
Quick as a flash, the youth scaled the 4-feet wall behind his chair and took the plunge.
Wife Prema, father-in-law Sania Oraon and four other attendants who were present were so stunned at the the speed with which Ramjeet acted that they couldn’t do anything to stop him.
But providence saved Ramjeet as he crashed on the soil dump instead on a concrete ground.
“A drain is being constructed, with digging underway. This is why a soft mound of soil served to cushion the patient’s fall. Otherwise, he would have surely crashed to his death,” a RIMS security guard said.
RIMS superintendent S.K. Choudhary confirmed the incident, saying the patient had been undergoing treatment at the neurosurgery ward on the third floor since March 20 evening.
Clinically depressed or psychotic patients sometimes show suicidal tendencies, say medical experts.
RIMS director Tulsi Mahto has directed the patient to be kept under “better observation” to avert any further suicide bid.
“Now, doctors and security guards are monitoring the patient. While it is true that due to his broken left leg, his mobility has been severely restricted, security guards have been asked to stay alert. We won’t take any more chances,” a nurse at RIMS said.
This is not the first suicide attempt at RIMS.
In a similar dramatic case on January 15 last year, a contract worker of Bokaro Steel Limited, Sanjay Singh, also 25, jumped off the second floor of the state-run hospital. Sanjay, who was being treated for severe burns, could not stand the pain and was suffering from depression. He pushed aside his wife Jaya Devi, ran out of the burns ward before the nurses on duty or the guard could stop him, entered a toilet and leapt out of its window to his death.
On January 12, 2011, a patient from Chas Nala in Dhanbad, Uttam Kumar Dutta (44), died of a fall from the second floor, but investigations revealed it was an accident.
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