Ravi Speaks:
My accident in Pathankot Dated 8th Feb-2017.
UPDATED ON 27.07.2022
In the sales profession, the most-risky aspect for every sales professional is his probability of getting hit or meeting with an accident, which is always on the higher side. The reason for that is his being always on a move, changing the modes of transport so randomly that in a day, a Sales Professional covers up to three to four hundred kilometres easily when he is going out of the city area. So sometimes even if he takes all the precautions while travelling or even while walking on the roadside-the accident occurs and the reason for that is mostly the person who hits him.
CAT SCAN BEING DONE
The same thing happened to me when I had gone on a week’s tour to the Himachal and Punjab states. It was the early morning at around 6.30 AM on February dated 8th 2017 when there was the season of winter with the cold wave in the whole belt of the extreme north of India. I had just checked out of the Hotel in Pathankot and reached the outside main gate of the Pathankot Bus stand. After getting down from the Auto which I had taken from the hotel till the Bus Stand-I was just crossing the main road towards the Bus stand-that suddenly something hit me with a strong force and I lost my consciousness there and then. I did not know what happened after that.
PATHANKOT BUS STAND
When I regained my senses, say after half an hour or so I found myself surrounded by quite a good number of people -who were trying to get me back into my senses. One gentleman around 24 -25 years of age was giving me water to drink in a tumbler and trying to see me comfortable. He was the only guy who was mainly taking all the pains in seeing me comfortable-whereas the others were just trying to ask me so many questions that I could not understand and reply accordingly. I realised I was taken to the side of the main road and kept on the raised wall of a closed shop with my official bag and the trolly bag on one side. I saw my trolly bag torn from the centre as if something had hit it in a circular motion With a force and taken out the shreds and fibres separately from the trolly bag in a scrambled way and those threads were dangling from all the sides in the bag. My official leather bag was intact. Suddenly I realized I had a stream of blood oozing out of my right side of the temporal portion of the head and it was not stopping at all. Those guys showed me the spot around seven to eight feet away from where I was removed to the roadside -this spot was a big pool of blood accumulated and seemed to be all fresh. It was exactly in the centre of the main road. They said that I was lying there for quite some time and since there was no motion in the body, these guys came there and picked me up unconscious and brought me to that side spot.
People there were asking me about my whereabouts and suddenly I realised that my iPhone-6, which I had bought recently and was paying its EMI still, was missing. I could not recall the phone numbers of my colleague based at Pathankot with whom I had already worked one day prior and, for the whole day, I was with him. Since I was in Pathankot, I wanted to could contact him immediately. He would be of great help on the spot. But for the contact numbers, which were all on the mobile phone-I could not do so. I remembered only one number and that was on my wife’s mobile and told that young boy who was taking all the pains to call on that number and connect me with it. Regarding my missing iPhone-I lost it and could not find it even after so many attempts made for its recovery through local Police and even through the Mobile Theft Centre of the Pathankot Police later on.
I remember one boy around 20 years of age weeping and telling me to forgive him for the accident. I said nothing to him but another gentleman told me the exact story of how I was hit badly by his Motorcycle, which he was driving at a very high speed in the morning and suddenly he hit me in the belly with his frontal moving wheel of the Bike. It was my trolly bag that came in between me (mainly my abdominal portion) and the forcefully moving frontal wheel and it got burst and all the threads came out. I was saved because of the trolly bag since it took & absorbed the whole momentum and even the rotational frontal wheel’s force and got torn off. Thus, I was saved, otherwise, the damages would have been even more critical.
THE PLACE WHERE I WAS GOING-DHARAMSALA.
My wife’s number finally was connected, and I told her the whole story in short of really telling her about my head injury and continued bleeding happening to me. I asked her to give me the mobile number of my Zonal manager of Punjab and Himachal, since I normally used to give her all the contact numbers for emergency purposes. She immediately gave me the ZM’s number and also contacted him directly, telling him to connect to me. Mr Hukam-Jamal-The ZM immediately contacted all the concerned people-specially the Pathankot guy, even the guy from Dharamsala-where I went that time in the early morning. He even contacted my seniors in the Bangalore Office and all the concerned. Thanks to him for his immediate action at that point in time-which proved very helpful for me-this I realised later.
BANDAGED HEAD FOR 10 DAYS.
Harsh took me in his vehicle to the Trauma Centre where the Specialist checked me and the blood oozing had not stopped yet even after the bandaging and emergency dressing by the earlier surgeon specialist. He told me that the stitches were to be applied since the cut on the head was enormous and then only the blood oozing would stop. So I was immediately taken into the Operation-Centre of the Trauma Hospital and stitches were put on my cut after local anaesthesia was given. I was told to remain under observation for two hours so that I might not vomit or even have a nauseating feeling. This was just to find out whether the head injury was there or it was just the peripheral injury.
PATHANKOT RLY. STATION
Meanwhile, another senior from Dharamsala, Mr Satish Sharma, came from Dharamsala and was with me and Harsh for the rest of the time until I was there. My seniors, in the meantime, gave the phone calls from the HO and asked about my welfare. Harsh attended to all those calls during that period. Harsh even gave me his second mobile and told me to keep that with me so that during the travel I was in touch and he could get the update from me about my health. I was by that time perfectly alright and did not have any nauseating feeling or vomiting etc as well. The doctor discharged me and Harsh arranged my immediate reservation in the Express train going to Delhi in the afternoon the same day both Harsh and Satish brought me to the Railway station and saw me comfortably getting into the Coach. Then I travelled for another five hours and reached Delhi in the late night-where my family received me and I reached my home safely.
I remained in the house with my head bandaged for a week and later again during my second check-up in Delhi; I was told to go in for CAT-Scan to rule out any apprehension in my mind regarding any serious head injury. The CAT Scan came out to be perfectly normal and I too heaved a sigh of relief. It was exactly after ten days of leave I joined my services again.
GOING BACK TO DELHI FROM PATHANKOT
In this Field Job, where one has to be always on a move-‘God Forbid’, the possibility of such mishaps is very much there and much as one would like to take all the precautions even then as the luck would have it -one can be the victim not because of his folly but the folly of the person who hits him or his vehicle. We have often seen so many Sales-people, unfortunately, facing accidents very often. Sometimes the people attribute such mishaps to the tension in the sales line or even the guy being in tension due to not meeting his stipulated targets in time or even the job insecurity to be the causative factors for the same. But I would like to say here one thing-tell any other job -where there is no tension, workload, or job insecurity questions not attached. Yes, one thing is for sure there-and that is the possibility of being more exposed to the running traffic and maddening crowds in our job of sales and one’s probability of accidental hits or related to such nature mishaps is higher. Let us take from our side all the precautions and safety norms to minimise such probable chances even. Rest leave to the Almighty God for Safety and Security.
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