Dr Omkar Hota(MBBS) : An Angel for the tribals of Southern Odisha

It is shocking to discover that there is only one qualified doctor to serve as many as 13,154 persons who live in rural Odisha. The Government of Odisha might be trying to post as many doctors in the remote Odisha, but unable to retain them as the new breed of physicians are engaged on the unethical and unscrupulous practices. Even more disgusting is to find the high rate of absentee doctors in the government hospitals.

Either you go to Veer Surendra Sai Institute of Medical Science and Research(VIMSAR), Burla or any other government hospital across the length and breadth of Odisha on questioning you will be told the doctor is on leave, but when you check their Facebook page you will find the doctor would be either holidaying in a star hotel at a hill station or in a resort at the seashore. The question is, how does these doctors afford to spend so much money? The truth is their holidays are being sponsored by the pharmaceutical companies whose medicines they do prescribe. Because of such absenteeism by these govt. doctors the poor patients are forced to visit the private nursing homes and pay the hefty fee.

This doesn't end here. The new gener of doctors of VIMSAR have  waged a war against their Director itself. Rather its Director professor Ashwini Pujhary is a man of strict discipline. He has taken every measure to curb the menace of private nursing homes, that are running at Burla. Some doctors have got unholi nexus with private nursing homes that are operating at Burla. They are asking patients to get admitted in those nursing homes so as they can give personal attention.

Where as on the other hand we got a countable doctors who are working at the grass root level with utmost loyalty to their job and the nation. Dr.Omkar Hota(MBBS) is such a physician for whom it is not only Odisha, but entire India should be proud of.

   

Poplur is located in the tribal dominated area of Malkangiri district of southern Odisha bordering Andhra Pradesh. It is somewhat a dense forest area. Even in 21st Century aboriginals live over here. This region languish in every field be it roadways, education, supply of potable drinking water, sanitation, electricity or be it public health system. At Poplur there is a Primary Health Centre(PHC) that has been setup  in the year 2002. But unfortunately no doctors joined over here because this region is cut off from the mainstream of life. But 15 years later it was only in the year 2017 Dr Omkar Hota(MBBS) joined here as an Asst.Surgeon.

Dr.Omkar Hota was born at Sahajbahal of Balangir district. On getting the first job posting he had to travel Malkangiri. From Malkangiri he had to travel 92kms to reach Chitrakonda. But over here the modern civilization come to a halt. From Chitrakonda there is no road ways farther. He had to walk 31kms all alone lifting his luggage on his shoulder. He climbed through two mountains of Bonda hill region and crossed Silur river. He recalls on joining medical college how his relatives had complimented him saying in future he would lead an alluring life, but he found the reality is in sharp contrast to such hypocrisy.

On reaching Populur he was dumbstruck to find half naked people all of whom are malnourished. The majority of these people belongs to Bonda, Dumba, Kaya, Paraja and Konda Reddy tribes. These people are the native Indians and does not carry the DNA of Aryans. These people are illiterates and know nothing about the existence of modern civilization beyond the forest, mountains and the Silur river.

The Primary Health Centre of Populur is made of a one room shed. During the day hours this shed is his clinic, but at night it turn to be his bedroom. Over there itself he cooks his morsel of food. There was no toilet and he need to go to the open field so as to attend the nature’s call.

Dr.Omkar Hota observed, when somebody falls sick with the symptoms of ordinary body aches, cold, cough or be it fever these tribal thinks the person has been victimized by some evil spirit. They calls a tantric(black magician) to cure the ailments. The tantric would perform some rituals instead of administering the patient with the medicines. The tantrik would ask to buy a chicken to appease the Goddess. To break the   blind faith of tribal people Dr.Hota walked from one village to another to create public awareness about health and hygiene.

There does not exist either a medicine store or a pathology lab. He had to test the blood or urine of the patients all himself. He found malaria was the primary cause of diseases. He made people aware about the benefits of using mosquito nets. Initially only 15 patients were coming to his dispensary in a day. But Dr Omkar Hota started visiting other villages.  Over the period of two years he won the confidence and the trust of these innocent tribal people. Now as many as 130 patients are turning out every day to get the cure from different diseases. In the weekly market day there the scenario outside his hospital is like a mini fair called as jatra in Oriya.

Over the last two years Dr Omkar Hota has gathered immense confidence of these tribal people. People pay utmost respect to him. This doctor does not accept any consultancy fee from his patients. However these forest dwellers out of affection brings forest products be it honey cumbs, forest fruits say mangoes during the summer, mushrooms during the rainy seasons.

During July 2017 one night it so happened at around 10PM a person hurriedly came saying a young woman is profusely bleeding and unable to deliver the baby. Omkar Hota the doctor on call 24X7 packed his bag and went along with the person. Together they walked for 16kms and reached Sadre village at around 12.55AM at the dead of the night. It was a case of obstructed labor. Our Dr Omkar Hota asked the female members at home to boil the water and in next one hour he did the safe delivery of a baby girl. The mother was safe so was the newborn baby.

At around 1.30AM Dr.Omkar said he have to return Poplur. The family members of the patient asked him to stayback for the night as it won’t be safe to travel back. The father of the new born baby girl prepared to accompany this doctor to drop him back at Poplur. But Dr.Omkar asked him to stay back as the mother needs his presence by his side. Those people alerted it may not be safe as bears might attack and tear him apart. But this doctor said at morning when patients arrive they would be helpless.

All alone he dared to walk back to Poplur. After walking some kilometers in the forest he sensed some commotion behind the trees. He stood still silently. Instead of a bear or a cheetah there appeared around 30 to 40 armed rebels. They gathered him around. One of them asked “tu ko bahinir ta?” which means “To which armed forces you belongs to?”. On the other hand another lady brigade caught hold of his hand and asked “Tor naam kaen ta?” But Dr.Omkar Hota unable to understand the events that happen in such a quick succession over the split of a few seconds.

Omkar said he is just a doctor, but the red rebels did not hear him. They beat him on the chest, abdomen and shoulders with sticks. They grabbed his beg and inspected it. All they found a stethoscope, thermometer, cotton, bandage, a bottle of spirit and few strips of tablets. The leader of the gang lifted his gun, but pointed it towards the sky and fired three round of bullets.

The leader said we honor you doctor for the services that you render to our poor people. The leader bag pardon to Dr.Omkar Hota and asked one of his young accomplish to drop the doctor safely at Poplur. But Dr.Hota feared to go along with the rebel, because if security personnel encounter on the way than he will be killed along with the rebel. Dr.Hota smiled and asked them to excuse him. He walked back home all alone. He reached his   home with body aches somewhere around 3.15AM dead of the night.

This doctor is immensely popular in his area that people calls him as “Bhagaban Daktar” which means Godly Doctor. Our nation India is healthy neither because of the doctors who are working in the corporate hospitals in the metropolitan cities, nor for those scrupulous doctors who are working in the government hospitals. A handful of doctors like Omkar Hota are working in the grassroot level of the nation to keep the common man healthy.

Apart from attending the patients in his clinic this  doctor has taken the welfare measures as well. Government of Odisha started constructing a roadway  from Disariguda to Poplur a distance of 15 kilometres. But the red rebels disrupted the works as they did not want this place to be connected with the rest of the state. They were found if roads would be constructed than police would reach this remote place and they would no more be able to rule the area. but Dr Hota mediated on behalf of Government of Odisha to a appease the red rebels to lay the roads.  He defended saying the ambulance would be able to reach the remote settlements of tribal people and they readily agreed.

On the occassiono of World First Aid Day has been felicitated by the Governor of Odisha his Highness Shri Ganeshi Laal at RAJ BHAWAN, Bhubaneswar.

The Bhubaneswar based civil society Yes We Can has felicitated this doctor as a Change Agent of Odisha in its Third Convention held at Sambalpur on 23rd January 2018.

Post script: Based on the life of Dr Omkar Hota in the year 2022  an Oriya movie with the title DAMaN has been released. Its  written and directed by Debi Prasad Lenka and Vishal Mourya and produced by Deependra Samal. The film stars Babushan and Dipanwit Dashmohapatra in the lead roles.

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E Kiran Mohan(The Writer)
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