Sukhmoti Maran Patel is 38 years old. She is a resident of Lakshmipur village, Pithora tehsil of Mahasamund district, Chhatisgarh. She is married and is the mother of four children. Her husband, Pautram, works as a farm labourer and vegetable vendor. They have a cow and sell milk on the side. Pautram does odd jobs…
Fenil Virendra Dhedia is a 20 year old B.com graduate living in Borivli, Mumbai. He is the youngest amongst his siblings. Following his father’s footsteps, Fenil works in a garment shop that sells children’s wear. Bite incident: Every year Fenil’s employer takes his staff for an annual outing. On 25th June 2015, thirteen staff members…
4 year old Mohit was playing with two of his friends outside their house. It was 7.30 p.m. and almost dark with lights from the various houses and street lamps illuminating the narrow road. Suddenly Mohit ran home to his mother crying in pain. On inquiry he replied something had bitten him. This is the…
Bachuben Shamjibhai Nadasiya was a 65 year old widow who lived with her 4 sons in Bhagamda Village, DhandhukaTaluka, Ahmedabad District, Gujarat. The family lived in a mud house with a thatched roof made of bamboo. The courtyard outside the house was fenced with thorny bushes to deter animals from entering the house. Bachuben’s four…
This story is from Kalasa town in the Mudegera Taluka, Chikmagalur Dictrict in Karnataka. A man had died of a King Cobra bite in Chikmagalur, Karnataka. This was a first for me as the King is an otherwise non-combative snake and prefers to flee than to stand its ground and attack. The incident happened on…
I was looking forward to my trip to Madhavpur (Ghed) in the Porbandar district of Gujarat. I had been exchanging notes with Arun Bhai who is the local expert treating snakebites at Krishna Health Centre under the supervision of Dr Ashwin Vanza. Arun Bhai has been a snake rescuer for 40 years and has been…
This true incident happened in July 2009 in Mander village, PO Madhavpur, District Porbandar, Gujarat. The total population of Mander is less than five thousand. Valiben Parmar was 33 years old then and already a grandmother. Her daughter Devi ben had just delivered a baby and was staying with them for a few weeks. It…
Rama Shankar was a 50-year-old carpet weaver from Mahamalpur Pipariya Village in the Mirzapur district of Uttar Pradesh. His monthly income was a meagre Rs1500. He had 4 daughters and a son. His wife Umavati did odd jobs in the village to support the family. They lived in a mud house, cooked on dry wood…
This is the story of Varjanbhai Alabhai Kadachha, a 40 year old primary school teacher. Along with his day job as a teacher, Varjanbhai is also a farmer and the family owns a flour mill. Varhanbhai is married and has three children. The family lives in Kadachha village in the Porbandar district of Gujarat. Kadachha…
This story is from Dhanyaha village, PO Ilahipur, District Hooghly in West Bengal. Dhanyaha is a non-descript village having houses that are bunched together surrounded by fields from all sides. The houses are built of cement, mud and bricks. The outer wall of every house has cow dung cakes pasted on it to be dried…