Doctors changing lives in naxal belts of Chattisgarh

New Delhi: Malaria, tuberculosis, Cholera HIV AIDS name the disease you have it here.

Here in the heart of the other India here in the country's poorest state Chattisgarh. But there is one glimmer of hope. Seven years ago eight doctors almost all of them from AIIMS giving up everything and come here not looking for money not for glamour but for a chance to serve the people who need to be served. The four couples are spreading sunshine here not far from the place where the Naxalite challenge the rule of the law.

And though it's just the dawn of a new day and the shadows still linger on these faces in the queue, rural Bilaspur gratefully acknowledges the presence of these doctors who are slowly changing their lives.

It happened more than ten years ago. Some doctors in AIIMS, the best medical institution in the country, wanted to do something more with their lives. They wanted to step out from a big city, move to the countryside and serve the rural poor. Idealism was more important than getting rich. It took a long time to set the hospital up in Ganyari, twenty km from Bilaspur town and seven years later the results are showing.

“We worship this hospital as temple, it’s a temple for us,“ says a villager.

It's that belief that doctors need to go to the countryside which matters to Dr Yogesh Jain, the inspiration of the team, the bubbling Dr Anurag Bhargav, the Mister Energy of the group, Dr Raman Kataria, the quiet surgeon and Dr Biswaroop Chatterjee, the polite microbiologist.


They had an intellectual support system here in Delhi. Doctors, scientists and the rare bureaucrats who believed in their dreams and helped them pursue it. Some of these doctors went to big schools, DPS Mathura Road and Modern School Barakhamba. Three of them are National Scholars and all four just came together as though they were a music band.

Dr Biswaroop Chatterjee says, “Yogesh asked me if I would join him then I decided I should go with him.”

What acted, as an even greater catalyst was that all four married doctors, Dr Madhuri Chatterjee, Dr Madhvi Bharagav, Dr Rachna Jain and Dr Anju Kataria. Some of them even met in AIIMS.

“We were working in the same hospital in AIIMS. It is not very simple to do but all of us were together there were eight of us and that has made thing easier,” says Dr Anju Kataria.

Every couple takes home a total salary of Rs 25,000. They don't want more because then it causes too much disparity with others member of the staff. Is that enough family income in the 21st century where gadgets have taken over our lives?

Anurag says, “Most of the many of the things are actually not essential. I don't think that I miss driving around in a Mercedes.”

“I mean if it was more than this we just couldn't be able to run the organisation. I mean we are taking 12, which is a huge chunk, “ says Dr Biswaroop Chatterjee.

In Ganyari, you get the feeling that it's the women who are sometimes doing more than their husbands. They do surgeries, they man the OPDs, they run the thirteen-bed ward and they even attend clinics in the remote villages.

Dr Rachna Jain says, “There is more satisfaction of course but there are financial constraints and I won't say they are not there and sometimes one regrets too but its okay but one feels more satisfied at the end of the day and you are happy.”

“I think one needs more if you have more of it…if you increase your own needs, you never where you can get satisfaction, “ says Dr Madhori Chatterjee.

So they keep their food simple in the canteen where doctors, patients, friends, other members of the staff come together. And it's all about self-service.

Self-sufficiency personal hygiene are both basic requirements here so after an ordinary and nutritious lunch you need to wash your own plate.

And they have their children whom they don't want to deprive and they are sent to Jain International, the best school in the outskirts of Bilaspur.

There are the birthday parties like this one for Biswaroop's daughter where they come together and talk everything but work.

They have ordinary lives some do have support system like Dr Rachna Jain's mother, who is also a doctor. She has taken a up a job at the Bilaspur hospital and lives in the neighbourhood to stay close to her granddaughters. She is quite honest that her son-in-law could have probably made more money.

Rachna’s mother Dr Chatterjee says, “Well its not my decision its there decision and before marriage if I knew. I would have taken the decision otherwise now its there decision.”

Dr Biswaroop and Madhuri Chatterjee have other worries. Their son has a medical problem for which they need money. The treatment is seriously expensive. He has to taken up temporary jobs elsewhere to keep the money coming in.

“I mean I am not switching the jobs but yes I mean defiantly I need more money for my son I mean although all my friends have been very supportive but even then as a father i feel obliged that ok what ever I can earn myself its better be done that way, “ says Dr Biswaroop Chaterjee.

Eight people who are together living out a dream they had dreamt ages ago. What about ego conflicts, there are bound to be differences.

Rachna Jain says, “There are moments of ego conflicts, there are problems but the main goal is same and the motive of coming together, we bear that in mind and we work together we do have problems.”

And so every Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings, Ganyari hums with activity. The queues are long. Jana Swasthya Sahyog has taken over health care in Bilaspur.

The primary health care centre is desolate, even the doctors and other staff are seldom present. Eight doctors have turned things upside down in this tribal and scheduled caste dominated very backward district.

The doctors are definitely not the firsts of their kind. Others like this equally popular bearded doctor traveled this path before. Dr Binayak Sen had given up everything after graduating from Christian Medical College, Vellore and had dedicated the early part of his medical career to the health of miners. He has been an inspiration for these doctors as well.

Fortunately Ganyari and Bilaspur, are slightly cut off from the spreading Naxalite map of the country. These doctors can avoid tough decisions, which Dr Sen didn't.

A remarkable change has been made possible in the past seven years. A big community of trained women have kept a close watch on the health of their neighbors.

Ambulances are bringing in emergency cases to the hospital where the doctors treat the patients with unimaginable dedication. But beneath this positive there is a question that these doctors have been asking - why is the social system so unjust and unequal?