Calcutta, Dec. 12: Chaitanya Singh Mehta, a 74-year-old patient at the Dhakuria AMRI last week, says he “smelt fumes” in his room around 2.15am. Mehta’s account to The Telegraph punches holes in what hospital sources have been saying so far — that the fire started at 3.30am — to explain why AMRI officials got in touch with police only at 4.10am. Two minutes before that — but nearly two hours after the fire was first noticed — the police had already called the fire brigade. The septuagenarian Bhowanipore resident’s version also tallies with the initial findings of police investigators, some of whom said several calls were exchanged among AMRI officials between 2.15am and 2.30am on Friday. Mehta was lucky: he climbed down the stairs and reached the emergency ward on the ground floor of the annexe building at 3.15am. He borrowed a mobile phone and called his family when the crisis snowballed, and was driven back home around 5am. Mehta said he saw “two fire engines” on his way out around 4.50am — more than 2 hours and 35 minutes after the fire was detected. The consultant to export companies was awake that night in a third-floor deluxe room because of breathing trouble. Mehta narrates the sequence of events: I couldn’t sleep since I was coughing repeatedly. I was admitted on November 29 with breathing trouble as water had accumulated in my lungs. I was up in my bed (number 2356) on the third floor when I smelt fumes in the room. It was around 2.15am. I called a nurse and told her about the burning smell. But she told me not to worry as everything was perfect. There was another patient in the room. The next 30 minutes I didn’t smell anything unusual. I thought I had probably got it wrong but still couldn’t sleep because of my coughing ailment. Around 2.45am, I heard screams from outside the room. I sensed something was wrong and got off my bed. I opened the door and stepped out but it was difficult to see much. Smoke had filled the corridor. I could smell smoke all around. There were desperate cries for help. I was hardly able to see anything. A nurse, whose surname I can recall as Abraham, pulled me towards the staircase. She held my hands and asked me to leave: “It’s not safe here any more. Go down.” I walked down the stairs and reached the ground floor. Smoke had not filled the ground-floor emergency ward till then. A few nurses and other hospital staff on the ground floor took me to the emergency ward. I asked them to give me oxygen as I was feeling suffocated. They immediately put an oxygen mask on my face. It was around 3.15am. A couple of other patients were also being administered oxygen at the emergency. I was there for around 15-20 minutes. Smoke was gathering outside the emergency. A nurse advised me to leave the building. “Go to the main building,” she said. The other patients too came out with me. Hospital staff escorted us to the main building. We were asked to sit in front of the reception. Very few patients were there. I was lucky to be among the first few to escape from the building. As I waited there for another 20 minutes, the crowd swelled. More patients arrived and hospital staff as well as people from outside were running around. Some rushed in with stretchers. Fear gripped me. I borrowed a mobile phone from a person waiting there and called my home. I had left my mobile phone and spectacles at the ward. It would have been about 4am. I told my family I would be waiting near the north slope of the Dhakuria flyover as the road in front of the main building was getting clogged with vehicles and people. My family members arrived in 10 minutes but they could not locate me at first. It took them about 30 minutes to locate me as it was dark and chaotic. I felt relieved when I got into our car and sat between my family members. It was around 4.50am but it was still dark. There was a police jeep and two fire engines outside the hospital by then and many local people. I came home about 5am. I was lucky to have been awake that night. Others who were asleep did not realise it early and suffocated to death. I have to carry on with my treatment. For that I need my medical records, which are lying in the hospital. I have written to the officer in charge of Lake police station. I need my records and my mobile phone, which has many important numbers stored. But I won’t stay in any hospital now for my treatment. I will remain at home and do as doctors advise. Before leaving the hospital, I asked a nurse if I could leave for home. She said: “Why should I stop you in this situation?” The nurse was very kind. Who knows, had I asked too many people they could have stopped me just to realise their dues. I was still in my hospital outfit when I arrived home. | 
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